Apologies for the delay, everyone. If you don't follow my Tumblr you probably thought me dead or lazy (which I am lazy, don't get me wrong...) when I didn't update. But here's the awful truth: real life things happened and my computer had to go into the shop for repairs. Now that I have it back, I've got more reliable Internet access and my Scrivener so that I can continue this fic!

In addition, my sincerest gratitude to my spectacular BETAs Wwwhat and obfuscatress for their patience and insight. Also to Jay for the Nino Rota recommendation and to rawr-balrog for making me fall in love with everything ever by Ólafur Arnalds.

Bond passed his physical examinations by the skin of his teeth. Even he couldn't explain how he had managed to get one point above automatic retirement from field duty, but by some miracle, Bond had. The numbers were bad, of course, and Bond was borderline, but he was still kicking and that was something. On the other hand, the psychological evaluation was much less favourable. Mallory wasn't impressed by Bond's abrasive manner during the interrogation, and not even twenty minutes after, word got round to Bond that he intended to sit him out for another two weeks of leave. But someone must have intervened, because first thing the next day, Bond received his clearance and a new assignment in Ecuador, for which he would be leaving the following morning.

"Don't cock it up," Mallory warned him, before sending him off.

So Bond made the rounds: flirting with the secretarial pool as much as he was able while collecting his travel documents, then down to get updated with Medical, then finally to Q-Branch, to be outfitted with his equipment.

It was late afternoon when Bond arrived, and Q was not in his office. A minion timidly relayed to him that Q was still in one meeting or another and would be back shortly. Bond took that as his invitation to wait in Q's closet of an office, where he sat in Q's chair and propped his feet up on the desk. When Q finally arrived about fifteen minutes later, he looked even more harried and tired than when Bond had seen him last. His arms were full of paperwork.

"Get your feet off my desk," he said briskly, and Bond obediently dropped his feet to the floor as Q dumped the stack on the ground near the door.

"Looks like you have half the rainforest there," Bond commented, nodding at the pile of paperwork.

"Yes, and the other half is on its way," Q replied. His voice sounded hoarse, and Bond wondered if it was from trying to talk sense into a stubborn committee board. "I assume you're here for your kit."

"I am. Should I be thanking you?" Bond asked, holding up the mission folder.

"I'm not sure what you're talking about," Q answered, with a good enough poker face that Bond almost believed him.

"Thank you," Bond said, as Q waved him up out of the chair and back onto the floor.

"Just promise you won't die."

Q led Bond to his workstation, where a kit already sat waiting beside his computer, but he did not hand it over immediately. Instead, he opened it up to look at and handle each piece of equipment, as if the triple checks on all outgoing inventory were not already effective enough.

"Why? Do you have money on me?" Bond asked, as he watched him.

"Twenty quid."

"That's all?"

"All I can spare. I'm going to have to buy my own lunches from now on."

"I'll make it up to you when I get back," Bond replied, as Q checked the chamber of his Walther and then its clip. There was something very appealing about his delicate, pale hands round the smooth metal of his gun, but Bond did his best not to think on it too much.

"I hope that means you'll be returning all my equipment in one piece," Q said, placing the weapon back onto the bed of foam, next to the already-approved earpiece and radio.

"Of course. I'll be sure to steer clear of all komodo dragons," Bond assured him.

Q closed the case and handed it over with a half-amused smile.

"Best of luck, 007. Try not to make a scene, if you could. Less paperwork for me."

"I'll do my best."

Bond ended up making a scene.

It was his first mission back, and he couldn't help it if explosions were necessary to celebrate his return. He suffered some minor burns and a small cut through his eyebrow, but he came home after two weeks relatively unscathed.

That, he could not say for MI6.

When he went to debrief, he found the place working on a skeleton crew. Apparently, some sort of nasty bug had gotten round, taking out over half the staff in the course of the fifteen days Bond had been out of the country. When Bond debriefed with Mallory, the other man dabbed at his red nose constantly and made an effort to not sniffle during their conversation. Luckily, it did not last long, and Bond escaped before he could start feeling badly for the other man.

Kit in hand, Bond went down to TSS, fully intending to drop off his equipment and then coerce Q out for dinner. He didn't want to admit it, but he had missed their lunchtime conversations while away. Q was easy to talk to, their conversations never strained or lacking. Q's wit constantly kept Bond on his toes, and his dry sort of humour always had a way of putting a smile on his face, even if Bond was not in the mood. It made Bond feel like he almost had a friend.

And he needed the company of a friend that night, when the remnants of adrenalin still flickered through his blood. It kept him too tense and alert to sleep, but did not deliver enough of a high to keep the aches and pains at bay, the ones that made him feel more old than accomplished at mission end.

But when he arrived downstairs, Q was not there. Apparently he had been one of the people affected by the plague going round, and had not been in that day. So one of his minions took care of the kit, handed Bond a stack of paperwork, and sent him on his way. With no intent to work on it, Bond dropped the folder on Q's chair and strolled out of Six. He stopped at the pub round the corner from his old flat and had fish and chips and a beer or two for a late dinner.

It was an off night, but the place was still relatively crowded. There was a woman making eyes at him from across the bar, but Bond pointedly ignored her interest as he finished his meal and drink and then left for the evening. On the way back to his flat, Bond wondered just why he had done such a thing. He wasn't too tired and she wasn't half-bad looking, but still, he had not been keen. Bond wondered if it was age catching up with him. It was better that than admitting he would rather go home to listen for his neighbour playing the piano than want an easy shag. He told himself again and again that it was not the reason, and drove round London aimlessly in the evening traffic for some time.

When Bond made it home, it was quarter to ten.

Upon stepping into the foyer of his flat, he immediately heard the person upstairs. But the sounds were not their usual mellifluous notes from the piano or violin; they were of the harshness of a terrible cough. It came across deep and wet, even through several layers of plaster, and Bond winced up at the ceiling in sympathy. It made him sincerely hope that he had not touched any surfaces while at Six, because getting sick was the last thing he wanted.

Bond listened to his neighbour for hours in between having a shower and trying to read a novel he had picked up on a whim at the airport. He tried not to worry about 507, who said without even knowing Bond that they would play music if he needed, to just tap three times and that was all. They didn't ask for anything in return and maybe that was why, when Bond lay in bed that night, he could not sleep. What kind of person would do that? And someone who worked for Six, no less. That sort of kindness had been stamped out of all of them long ago, hadn't it?

The coughing tapered off for an hour or two, then picked up in the middle of the night. Come morning, Bond hadn't slept much, and he still heard the muffled sound of coughing above him, indicating that his sickly neighbour hadn't either.

Despite bone-deep exhaustion, Bond dressed and went for a run, then stopped at the nearest chemist on his way back to the flat. Bond picked up cough medicine and drops, a box of paracetamol, tissues, some crackers, and a few cans of soup, which he left on the doorstep of 507 with a knock and a note:

Get well soon.
-407

He left before they could make it to the door.

Three days passed and the weather turned colder. It began sleeting more often than not, so Bond took his morning runs inside to MI6, which kept him away from the flat for longer stretches of time throughout the day. He did not see Q or Eve during these days, but he did run into Tanner, who, like Mallory, was in the process of recovery.

"It's been a nightmare," he admitted, when he and Bond caught up during a brief lunch in between Tanner's meetings. "Most of our branch heads are out with it, so we're thinking it went round in one of the board meetings. Do you know, we nearly had to sedate Eve to send her home? Poor thing worked herself into walking pneumonia before we finally got her to take the week off. Q wasn't any better, let me tell you, but at least we got him offline and in bed where he belonged." Bill paused and sighed as he leant back in his seat. "And on top of it, Mallory was stubborn enough to go to his meeting with the PM last week, so now she's spreading it round her office. I just know I'm going to get a call from Parliament any day now."

"Sounds like London will fall in no time," Bond said.

"If I knew it wasn't this bloody awful weather, I'd blame terrorists," Tanner said, and Bond laughed. He let Bill go soon after to attend to all the crises that were undoubtedly happening in the absence of almost all authority. He spent his afternoon in solitary: training, then swimming in the pool, before finally going home.

Bond heard his neighbour move about very little that night, as had been the norm for the past few days. It took all his self control to not investigate to see if they were alright. But because it was an invasion of privacy-and the fact that any MI6 personnel would undoubtedly have a coronary if a Double-Oh climbed through their window-Bond refrained, and instead continued to leave packages at the doorstep every morning in hopes that they would soon recover.

At the end of that week, things at MI6 began to pick up again as people returned to work. Everyone still looked exhausted and sounded terrible, but they were at least back to getting things done. When Bond stopped by to see Eve, she had absolutely no voice and had to write things down on pads of paper to have a conversation. She looked tired, but grateful when Bond handed over a cup of tea he had picked up especially for her. There were piles of paperwork on her desk and probably twice as many emails, so Bond left her be after a short visit and went in search of Q.

He found the other man in his office behind his computer, also surrounded by mountains of folders.

"You just had to blow up Ecuador, didn't you?" Q asked, not even looking at Bond. His voice was almost entirely gone, making his question less biting than he probably intended.

"It needed a facelift," Bond replied.

"You need a facelift," Q grumbled from the other side of the monitor.

"You must be sick if that's the best you can come up with," Bond said.

"Sod off. While you've been destroying Quito, I've been coughing up a lung."

"You'll be fine. You have two for a reason."

Q threw a biro at him.

"Are you done?" Q asked.

"Well I was going to insult you and then buy you lunch."

"My lucky day."

"I'll bring you soup," Bond offered, but Q shook his head.

"I don't want to even think about food for a while," he replied, looking a little green at the mention.

"You have to eat," Bond said, over the sound of Q's phone ringing.

"Yes, mother, I'll be fine," Q replied, and held up a sleeve of crackers he had stashed under a report with one hand, waving Bond off with the other. Bond took that as his dismissal and left Q to work in some semblance of peace.

When he went home that evening, he was surprised to find a plain kraft paper bag on the doorknob. Inside was a bottle of Glenfiddich and another CD case with a note that read:

I think you you saved my life.
Consider this my thanks.
I hope both are to your taste.
Always,
-507

Bond brought both inside, but spent less time looking at the alcohol and more with the disc. This one had an insert sheet on the inside cover where there were notes in his neighbour's script. It read: 407 - Recorded 20/10/2013-21/10/2013.

Immediately, Bond took it into his bedroom, where he put it in the Bose player with the other CD, which he often played before he went to sleep. Just like the other song, the intro was so soft that Bond barely heard it, until the music swelled in intensity and volume. It wasn't quite melancholy, but it wasn't joyful either, characterised by a distinct yearning for something unreachable. It lodged itself just under Bond's ribcage and filled the space with every note, every breath, until Bond felt full of it. And then, it quieted until it suddenly stopped, halfway through a heartbeat, leaving Bond hanging on the edge of a precipice he did not quite know he had reached.

He sat in the silence, that last note ringing in his ears until it, too, faded into nothing but the creak of floorboards.

A week later, Bond heard the news that MI6 would be moving to a new location, though when and where had still not been disclosed to all personnel. Bond did his best to get in touch with Moneypenny-who would definitely have that information-but she was completely unreachable, as was Tanner. Most likely they were hiding from the onslaught of people who were wanting answers to the vague email that had begun circulating that morning.

With no one in Administration to bother, Bond took his questions to TSS, where he found a very annoyed Q cramped up in his office with what seemed like the entirety of R&D. They were all talking at once about the move, demanding dates and locations so that they could begin the transfer process.

"Once I know the particulars, you will all be immediately notified," Q said, raising his already-strained voice over the din. Bond could tell that he was trying to get them out of the office, and not entirely because they were being obnoxious; he remembered that Q once mentioned his claustrophobia, which was the reason they never closed the door during their lunchtime conversations. All those people were most likely triggering that reaction and Bond felt something twist in his chest that made him intervene.

"You heard him. Move along," Bond said.

He had never seen so many faces go so simultaneously pale before. Within seconds, the boffins had cleared out, leaving Q looking relieved and grateful in their wake.

"I'm going to need to get you on speed dial," Q told him, before turning his head to cough into the crook of his elbow. Bond politely leant against the doorframe to give him space, and waited until he was through. When the weak fit passed, Q's cheeks were flushed with the exertion and his eyelashes were damp. Bond felt a traitorous thought emerge in his mind that he quickly chased away, because thinking his Quartermaster gorgeous was dangerous territory indeed. Just friends, Bond reminded himself, because he was not about to go down that road again, not with Q.

"Ugh this bloody cold," Q mumbled, removing his glasses to rub at his eyes with the back of his hand.

"Alright?" Bond asked, as Q put his lenses back on.

"Alright as ever," he answered.

"You look peaky," Bond continued.

"One usually does after when they don't have time to see the sun."

"The sun's out today. Let's get lunch."

Which is how they ended up in a shop round the corner from Six, seated at a table so small, their knees touched. The place was loud and crowded with the lunch rush, but the food was good, and it was satisfying in a way that Bond couldn't quite name to see Q eating a healthy portion of real food instead of subsisting on handfuls of crackers and biscuits.

"I eat," Q said, when Bond brought it up.

"You eat like you're starved," Bond replied, looking at Q's empty plate. "I don't think I've ever seen someone eat so fast before."

Q went a lovely colour with obvious embarrassment.

"I eat when I remember," Q amended.

"Or when someone brings you food," Bond said, and Q made a noncommittal noise as he nicked one of Bond's chips from his plate. Bond allowed it, going so far to nudge the dish at Q should he want more. He wondered what they looked like to other people, sitting in their huddled corner, sharing the remains of their lunch. Did they look like two mates out on a work reprieve? Or something more? Bond even wondered in that moment what they were exactly, because even though Bond thought friends was enough, he sometimes caught himself looking in ways that weren't appropriate because it wasn't enough. He wondered if it was loneliness, wondered if it was the simple fact that there were very few people in the world who didn't want to kill him-or hadn't already killed him, in Moneypenny's case-and Q just happened to be one of them.

"You're thinking," Q said.

"Is that a crime?" Bond asked.

"It should be," Q replied, with no malice, just humour. Bond quirked a grin at him, and Q returned it, but didn't resume the conversation until they were on their way back to Six. They were standing at the crossing with their hands in their pockets against the cold, waiting for the pedestrian signal when Q spoke up.

"Is there anything you need?" he asked, and Bond looked at him. The sun had disappeared sometime during their lunch hour and London was drizzling; the moisture clung to Q's dark hair in misty waves. "You know, to help with the thinking bit?"

Bond turned his attention away from Q and stared straight ahead.

"No," Bond said.

"Ah, well, I'm here if you need," Q said, his usual eloquence gone, leaving an awkward offer in its place. Q must have noticed it, because he tripped over his words to continue with: "When it comes to personal matters, I'm not good at the talking part, but I do listen, for what it's worth."

"Thanks, Q," Bond said, as the light signalled for them to cross. He caught a glimpse of Q out of the corner of his eye, smiling something a bit sad as he said:

"Any time."

Come the beginning of November, Bond was informed that he would be sent out on a long term mission that could last into the New Year. With only twenty-four hours notice, Bond made use of the time cleaning up his apartment, making sure to bin the milk and takeaway containers so that they did not grow their own ecosystem while he was away. Then he made the calls through Six's Service line to have someone maintain the flat, collect the mail, pay the telly bills, and those sorts of things.

After all was said and done, Bond slept the remaining hours away and slipped out of his flat at five in the morning to catch the first flight out of Heathrow. But before he left, Bond went upstairs and posted a note to 507's door, which read:

I'm going away for a while
I'll miss your music when I'm gone
Take care
-407

Before Bond could think better of it, he left.

He had minimal contact with Six during his time in the States, where he had been enlisted to help Felix infiltrate a group that he suspected might be related to Quantum. At the end of it, the assignment was for naught, as it turned out they had no connection to the group. He and Leiter had a time of it, at least, and it was nice to catch up under less-stressful circumstances. But come mid-December, Bond had an ache for London that he couldn't soothe in D.C. or New York City, and Felix agreed to do all the paperwork and let him loose a week early.

Unfortunately, Bond found himself grounded at Laguardia because of inclement weather, and by the time he made it back to England, it was a few days before Christmas Eve. He caught a taxi and made it home at some ungodly hour of the morning. Aware of his neighbours, Bond tread as lightly as he could in the corridor, and took care to not make too much noise once in his flat. After a half-hearted shower, Bond fell into bed and slept for thirteen hours straight.

When he woke up, it was mid-afternoon. The building felt still and quiet around him, such a difference to the noisy hotel rooms he had inhabited for the past month and a half. Groaning, Bond got up to make coffee, and he was on his way to the living room to lounge on the couch when he saw it.

There was a jewel case on the floor in his foyer.

Bond went and collected it immediately. There was a note inside that read:

Welcome home
Always,
-507

Like the previous, the disc had a written insert. It read, in 507's particular brand of left-handed scrawl: 407 - Recorded 17/12/2013. Bond took it and a fresh cup of coffee into his bedroom where he added the CD to his player. Just like the other songs, the opening was so soft that Bond barely heard the notes of a solitary piano. They were as soft and repetitive as rain, soon overlayed with the movement of several violins. The infusion of the sounds was like nothing Bond had ever heard before, something epitomising the feeling of isolated introspection, tinged at the edges with a loneliness that Bond knew all too well.

He lay down on the bed and closed his eyes. He expected to think of something melancholy, to remember the terrible things that woke him up in the middle of the night. But there was nothing in the space of his head except for him and the music and the beating of his own heart.

When the song finished, Bond swore he could still hear it resonating in the silence.

That afternoon, Bond went to MI6.

Although the new location had been undisclosed when Bond left for the States, he got word of it through Leiter's contacts at the CIA a few weeks ago: MI6 had returned to their old fortress, the Babylon-on-Thames. When Bond stepped onto the pavement at Vauxhall and looked up at it, there were no traces of damage from Silva's attack, no indication that that had ever happened in the first place. It stood proudly as a symbol against all their enemies, that England would not cower and hide in the face of adversity, that She would rebuild, that She would prevail, always. Something about seeing her sturdy, strong walls in the mid-winter light raised a kind of hope in Bond he thought had left him long ago.

Now that was a grand old warship if he'd ever seen one.

He went inside through the doors he thought he might never walk through again, and took the lift to the top floor. When he stepped out, Bond paused and looked down the familiar corridor. The carpet had been changed and the paint smelt fresh on the walls, but the light still fell across the threshold as it always had, because it was the same unmistakable hallway that he had walked many times before. Despite this, Bond did not move, because he knew that when he reached the end of the corridor and walked through the entryway to the head office, M would not be at her desk, with that ugly old bulldog sitting watch to the right of her rolodex. The desk might be the same and the chair and the window overlooking London, but it would be Mallory sitting there instead of her, because she was dead and gone and buried and Bond had nothing to remember her by but that bulldog on his mantle and the ghost of her that he felt in this hallway that had once been hers.

But there was nothing he could do for the dead, so Bond put his hands into his pockets and tried to push away that thing at the back of his mind that felt uneasy, and walked the rest of the way with a confidence he had to fake.

When he entered the office, Bond found Moneypenny at a new desk with a sleek new computer and a view of the overcast city past her shoulders. She looked up at him and smiled like she had been expecting him.

"Welcome back," she said, and held up her hands. "And I do mean back."

"Never thought I would see this place again," Bond replied, taking a seat across from her.

"Still the same old Six, just with new carpeting and a fresh coat of paint. Oh, and that bloody big hole in the front has been repaired too," Eve said jokingly. "Other than that, not much has changed."

Bond glanced to the side, at the door that had once led to M's office.

"Enough has," Bond said.

Eve looked a bit uncomfortable for a moment, but then bounced right back into conversation.

"How were the States?"

"Tedious," Bond answered.

"And yet, here you are, almost two weeks earlier than expected, and with no reports of damaged property from the CIA," Eve said. "This might be a record."

"Early Christmas gift," Bond answered.

"If I didn't know any better, I'd say you were on your best behaviour. Almost like you're trying to impress a certain Quartermaster?"

Bond did well to not let anything show in his expression. Either Moneypenny knew something she shouldn't or she was making very large leaps that happened to border a bit too closely with the truth.

"I suppose that means you don't know any better," Bond replied.

Eve's mouth quirked round a smile.

"What do you need, then?" she asked. "Or are you just here to wish me a Happy Christmas?"

"I need you to look something up for me," Bond said, removing a Post-It from his pocket, which he handed over to Moneypenny. "The person who lives at this address."

"What's wrong with Google?" Eve replied, taking the paper with a raised eyebrow.

"Give me some credit," Bond said.

Eve laughed and read the address.

"Having trouble with a neighbour?" she asked.

"What?"

"This is your building, right? One of the new MI6 flats in Chelsea?"

"How do you know?"

"I heard about your relocation a while ago. Accounting was in fits over your hotel fees."

Bond grinned and Moneypenny scowled at him.

"Nothing to be proud of," she scolded.

"Yes it is," Bond said, and Eve let out a breath of annoyance.

"So what's the problem? Barking dog? Noisy sleepwalker? The third shift nymphomaniac?" she asked, edging on a grin at the last one.

"No, I just want to know who they are," Bond replied.

"Well, everyone is MI6, you know that. So all their files are locked," she answered.

"Can't you get around that?"

"You're talking to the wrong person."

Bond frowned at her, because if there was anyone who was the right person, it was Moneypenny. Being right-hand to M gave her that power.

"But can't you see everything?" Bond inquired.

"Not everything, just the important bits that we might need in an emergency. The rest is encrypted, too, for extra security," Eve replied. "After Silva, TSS thought it best that we couldn't be too careful."

"So I'd have to talk to Q, then?" Bond asked, and her little enigmatic smile returned.

"He's not here right now," Eve replied.

"Where is he, then?" Bond asked.

"Moving. We're still transferring equipment from the old base. It's been a nightmare," Eve said. "But even if he was here, he wouldn't let you in, either. It's against regulations. We have to keep our employees safe. That means guarding their privacy."

"So that even you can't find where they live? What if there's an emergency?" Bond asked.

"There's backup for that, but that's none of your business. Off you go," Moneypenny said, making a shooing motion with her hand.

"Eve-"

"If you want to know so badly, just go and talk to them. Maybe she's cute?" she interrupted with a smile.

Bond regarded her suspiciously, wondering if she was doing this just to make his life difficult.

"Happy Christmas, Miss Moneypenny," he said, and turned his back.

Eve's laughter followed him down the hallway to the lifts.

Bond ran into Q the following day.

It wasn't quite by accident, because Bond had decided to go to old HQ to check up on him after so many weeks away. He assured himself that friends did those sorts of things, so it wasn't completely out of line, even if his plan was to simply go and watch from an unobserved distance. So Bond hadn't expected to literally collide with the other man in the hallway. Q made a startled sound at the impact, and promptly dropped everything he had been carrying as he stumbled back.

"Buggering fuck-" Q said, looking at the mess, then at Bond with the exasperated expression that Bond found he oddly had missed. There was just something about the way Q looked when borderline angry, something that reminded Bond exactly how long he had gone without someone pretty and intelligent in his bed. He chased that thought away as soon as it came.

"Didn't take you for being so foul-mouthed, Quartermaster," Bond said.

"I'll show you foul-mouthed…" Q grumbled, straightening his glasses. "You really ought to wear a bell."

"You shouldn't startle so easily," Bond teased, and knelt down to help clean the mess.

"I was doing well while you were gone. No secret agents to sneak up on me," Q replied, joining Bond on the ground to begin collecting up the scattered computer parts upon the floor.

"Sounds like my absence gave you a false sense of security," Bond said.

"Ah, see, I beg to differ. I would call it normalcy," Q replied.

"Boring," Bond said.

"There's been no time for boring," Q answered, though there was something of a smile on his lips.

"You missed me," Bond said.

"I did," Q replied, and before Bond could register what that meant, the other man continued: "It would have been marvellous to have a strong back round here to help with this move."

"Cold," Bond said, as Q arranged the pieces onto the tray he had been carrying. "And here I was going to offer to buy you dinner."

Q looked up from his work with an expression that made Bond realise just how his offer came across, so he quickly added:

"You're looking scrawny."

It wasn't really a lie. Q did look a little thinner than the last time Bond had seen him, and his clothes were perpetually wrinkled, giving him the look of someone very aged and tired. And although Bond meant nothing malicious by it, Q looked offended.

"I'm not scrawny," Q said, nose wrinkling in annoyance, in a way that Bond thought too attractive. He mentally berated himself and continued:

"You are, hence the reason why I'm buying you dinner," Bond replied.

"Well, as well-intentioned as the offer is, I'll have to take a rain check until after the New Year," Q said, standing with his tray in some semblance of its previous order. "Everything will finally be sorted by then."

Bond stood up to regard him face-to-face again.

"So you're not going to eat for two weeks then?" Bond asked.

"Don't be so dramatic, Bond," Q replied, and began walking the way he had originally been headed. "It's not like I'm incapable of feeding myself without you nearby."

"Not incapable, just forgetful," Bond said, and Q turned back to regard him.

"It's good to have you back, Bond. Happy Christmas."

And with that, he was gone.

Bond told himself that he was done with drinking himself to death every few days, but after a dry spell of nearly two months, Bond needed something.

That night, he went to one of his usual haunts and drank until he couldn't see straight. There were fairy lights everywhere and tinsel and trees decorated with baubles and bright garlands. Everyone was cheerful, as cheerful as holiday music and Christmas sweaters. Bond tried to drown it out the best he could, but even the alcohol couldn't dilute the ache in him, fill the hollowness that seemed perpetual on nights like these.

He ended up calling it a night rather early, not in the mood for company even if that was what he ultimately desired. But the thought of the work that went into it was too much-having to be someone else was too much-and Bond left with his head down against the sleet, where he then took on a quiet, uneventful taxi ride back to his flat.

Upon arriving home, Bond immediately went into his bedroom, not even bothering to disrobe or remove his shoes. He lay in bed and listened to the most recent disc he had received, putting on repeat so that the ending blended with the beginning until the piece was neverending, seamless and perfect to ride out this tumultuous thing inside him. He blamed the time of year. Holidays were always the worst, because they served to highlight the loneliness and despair more acutely than the chronic ache he felt throughout the year. And now, returning to MI6, he felt M's absence raw and ragged, the clot on a wound torn away.

He wondered if it would ever heal, or if it would be a forever gash, like the one Vesper left behind.

Bond lay there for some time, losing himself in the melancholy of his mind, in the music, in the haze of alcohol that began to taper off into sobriety. The crisp reality was unwanted, bringing Bond back to the needs of his body: the tiredness, the hunger. He sat up and turned the music off, running his hands over his face. The clock on the bedside said it was nearing midnight, but Bond knew a place that would still deliver, so he got up and went to the kitchen to find the number.

Ignoring the stack of mail on his counter, Bond rummaged through the drawers until he found the menu, and then placed his call. The food arrived close to the same time as 507 came home; Bond heard their tread in the foyer above him, the quiet click of the door. As Bond served himself a healthy portion of rice, chicken, and vegetables, he tried very hard not to listen to his neighbour move about the flat. But somehow, he had become hyper-aware of this person since he had moved in, and still remained so even after almost a month abroad. He knew their footsteps and habits as intimately as a lover's, but still he did not know them.

As he sat at his table alone, Bond wondered if 507 was sitting down to a solitary supper too. In the few months since he moved in, Bond had never heard anyone come to visit, so they, like Bond, lived a quiet, private life. It was just a passing thought, but Bond wondered if they were lonely working long stretches of days at MI6, but if they found some sort of welcome companionship in knowing that they could play beautiful music for an appreciative audience of one. And then, Bond wondered what it would be like to meet them, beyond the notes and the discs and tapping at the ceiling at odd hours of the morning. Already, he felt a connection between them, something forged out of the shared beauty of the music, the quiet stories buried in the notes, the word always written in that particular left-handed script.

But it wasn't enough.

It wasn't like touching someone, feeling the warmth of another body, a gaze, a kiss. It was something felt between floorboards, removed and distant in a way that made Bond desperate for contact, for something more than the loneliness of their isolation.

And almost as if they had read his mind, Bond heard the sound of a bow over strings, the draw of a note that caressed the air and filled the empty void between them. It was unfamiliar at first, but by the second bar, Bond realised that he knew the song, the lull and lilt of a long-forgotten childhood in Scotland, when Christmas carols were still sung by a happy family Bond could barely remember.

He leant back and listened to the soft melody of Silent Night, the faint clicking of a pedal as certain sections were repeated on a loop while new notes were played. It was beautiful artistry, seemingly effortless, and Bond didn't necessarily feel cheerful, but his thoughts had calmed, no longer of Vesper or of M or of that aching loneliness. And it might have been a small, temporary accomplishment, but it was something.

Music Credit

A Time For Us composition by Nino Rota, performed by Cyril de Saint-Amour

Fyrsta by Ólafur Arnalds

Silent Night by Lindsey Stirling