Multiple Requiem
Half an hour later and Q was stepping inside the National Gallery, shivering from the cold.
Since he hadn't been outside in a few weeks, he'd slightly maybe kind of possibly forgotten what month it was, and he very quickly realised that he most certainly did not have mid-December-appropriate clothing in his suitcase, especially since it had decided to snow in London for the first time in years. Bill had merely shook his head at him in exasperation before handing over his own windbreaker. It was too long in the sleeves and smelled strongly of peppermints with just a hint of alpha, presumably from M, but it was warm and cosy and Q was more than grateful to have borrowed it once he saw just how wintery it was outside.
Shaking snowflakes from his hair, he paused just inside the door, both to warm up from his ten minute walk there, but also to brace himself for the inevitable combat that was 00-bloody-7.
He'd read all of the double-0s files when he'd first started working at '6, curious and interested in seeing what all the fuss was about. Unlike his own personnel file, those of the double-0s were rife with information, though Q was rather amused to find out that a lot of it was pure rumour. It seemed that the double-0s all had a lot in common, item number one being their pathological need to cause as much confusion and chaos as possible. Every single one of them had failed every single psych test ever thrown at them, except on one notable occasion when 001 - aka. Alexis Palladino - had aced it perfectly. Considering that every answer she'd given was the sanest possible answer, however, the psychiatrists very quickly realised that she'd just memorised the "correct" answers in order to fuck with them which apparently, is not a sane thing to do.
Q couldn't wait to meet her.
Briefly pausing to glance at the map ("Room 34, National Gallery, Trafalgar Square. He'll be waiting" Bill had said) he started heading towards the Central Hall.
007, however, seemed to be in a league of his own. The man's file was almost as thick as three other double-0s put together and that really was saying something. The son of Scottish and Swiss aristocrats, orphaned at a young age, travelled as a teen, picking up languages and rather unsavoury skills here and there, before eventually joining the Royal Navy where he was praised for his intelligence and scorned for his aversion to authority. Overall, Bond's file painted him as a rather colourful figure, a charming sauve womanizer, more than capable of succeeding at whatever was thrown at him despite his somewhat unconventional approaches and indifferent attitude.
Q was quite looking forward to meeting him too.
He couldn't deny that he was nervous, however, as he turned right in the Hall and walked past paintings by Canaletto, Guardi, and Claude. As quartermaster, it was now up to him to somehow wrangle these hyped-up alphas into some semblance of submission, or, failing that, some sense of accountability. It was no secret that the double-0s were simply overglorified hitmen, but the really troubling bit was their inert killer instinct. These weren't just alphas, loud and brash and occasionally aggressive, these were predators.
Q had already gotten on the wrong side of such a creature once before in his life, and he had no desire to do so again.
The double-0s enjoyed killing, enjoyed causing terror and destruction and chaos, and it took a mighty strong hand to keep them in line. With Boothroyd, it was easy. The old man had been there long before any of the current double-0s had started, and Q had heard more than one rumour about the favouritism the Major had shown them. Put simply, the previous Quartermaster had been kind, had treated these vicious killing machines as people rather than weapons, as the rest of MI6 were wont to do. He had earned their respect, and in their eyes, that has elevated him above the rest of their prey.
With R, it was different. They… tolerated her, in one sense, because she was a fellow alpha, because she did her job properly, because she never threatened them. But R had told Q herself that if it came down to it, the double-0s would kill her in a heartbeat if her death meant the survival of themselves or England. They happily spoke to her, but they wouldn't hesitate to slit her throat, and surprisingly, it was a relationship that she was okay with.
"They're not wired like us, Q" she had told him, during one of his first weeks at MI6, "They're… They're human, yes, of course they are, but they're not… people. They don't have the same instincts as normal people. Everything they do, everything they say is… calculated. Life is a game and each mission is just another level to them… I'm glad that the double-0s don't like me. Everywhere they go, they leave a trail of death and destruction behind them. So god help the person that they find interesting".
Understandably, those words had stuck with him for a long time. He'd never spoken to the double-0s, not that he was given much chance to, but occasionally he'd see them stroll through R&D searching for Boothroyd. And Q had known a lot of alphas in his time, some more violent than others, but the double-0s… they were on another level entirely. They commanded attention, whether you wanted to give it to them or not, and every move they made was deliberate and almost charming. They were predators, it was as simple as that. Whatever evolutionary gene that turned baseless alphas into respectable members of society had clearly skipped the double-0s.
Or else, Q mused, coming to a stop in the doorway of Room 34, they were just another step above them in the evolutionary food chain.
Bond wasn't hard to find, and yet, somehow, he was also just as easy to miss. Q realised that if he hadn't actively been looking for the double-0, then he would have simply glossed over him entirely.
The man was sitting on a bench in the middle of the room, unnaturally still and completely silent. He was staring at the artwork in front of him, an oil painting by Turner, if Q wasn't mistaken, but there was something purposeful in his gaze, hardly blinking and never straying, as if he were trying to commit the painting to memory.
Q still wasn't quite sure what he was going to say or do when he met one of the most dangerous men alive. In one sense, he was almost grateful that Bond was the first double-0 he was officially meeting, because quite frankly if he could survive this particular double-0, then the others should be a breeze. He wasn't a stranger to dangerous men, and definitely wasn't unused to dangerous alphas, but he was still smart enough to keep his wits about him because predators like 007 could smell fear.
Despite R's warnings, he knew that the only way to wrangle control of the nine maniacs was to keep them interested. If he could gain their respect, if he refused to back down or show fear, then perhaps they'd simply be surprised enough into behaving.
Or, at least, that was the plan.
Taking a deep breath, the omega stepped into the room and made his way towards the alpha.
Once more unto the breach, as they say.
Q quite preferred the phrase the final frontier.
Walking over, he carefully sat down on the bench next to the agent, the older man glancing over at him as he did so. Q firmly kept his gaze straight ahead, letting the man look. He was still wearing his scent blockers, after all, so there was no risk of 007 outing him as an omega, and yet…
Bond blinked once, shifted in his seat slightly, and then turned back to the painting, obviously not finding anything interesting about him.
"... It always makes me feel a bit melancholy. Grand old warship. being ignominiously haunted away to scrap". Q sighed and finally turned to face the man. "The inevitability of time, don't you think?"
There was no response.
"What do you see?"
"A bloody big ship".
The bastard was actually dismissing him.
"Excuse me".
He made a move to stand and Q thought fuck this.
"007".
He paused.
"I'm your new Quartermaster".
The alpha sat back down with an almost amused look on his face.
"You must be joking".
Which-
Rude.
"Why, because I'm not wearing a lab coat?"
"Because you're still a pup".
Q blinked, surprised, and turned to him. James bloody Bond stared back, weatherbeaten and rugged and scarred but still, somehow, handsome. He quickly looked away again.
"Age is no guarantee of efficiency".
"And youth is no guarantee of innovation".
Don't antagonise the double-0, don't antagonise the double-0, don't antagonise the double-0.
"Well, I'll hazard I can do more damage on my laptop sitting in my pajamas before my first cup of earl grey than you can do in a year in the field".
Fuck.
"Oh, so why do you need me?"
Was he- Was he actually smiling?!
"Every now and then a trigger has to be pulled" Q admitted, feeling somewhat out of sorts.
"Or not pulled. It's hard to know which in your pajamas".
He could feel the alpha's gaze burning into the side of his face.
Any minute now and he was going to snap. He had to. This was double-0-fucking-seven, one of the most dangerous men in the world, the alpha with the highest confirmed kill count in Britain, and Q had just insulted him straight to his face.
Instead, the man held out his hand.
"Quartermaster".
He couldn't help but smile as he shook it.
"007".
James bloody Bond was exactly like and nothing like Q had predicted, and in a weird twisted sense of logic, that statement seemed to make perfectly good sense.
Having read his entire file back to front, the Quartermaster had built up an image of a somewhat debonair, vengeful, violent, yet completely controlled sociopath. He ticked all the boxes, after all, and beneath that thin veneer of sophistication lurked an egotistical, womanising, thrill-seeker, with a healthy dose of self-destructive tendencies. It was no wonder psych regularly refused to deal with him, and Q was surprised that the man hadn't been "retired" years ago. Given his success rate, however, perhaps the rewards were worth the risk.
Either way, what Q hadn't expected was for the agent to be all of that and more. Or, less, depending on how he looked at it. 007 was violent, yes, but all of that power, all of that aggression and killer instinct were tightly coiled just beneath his skin. He was imposing in an almost gentle way, quietly dangerous rather than wearing his alphaness on his sleeve like so many others were wont to do. Even more surprisingly, Q found that he actually… liked the man. He had a seriously twisted sense of humour, that much was for sure, but the Quartermaster wasn't exactly a bundle of joy himself, and he found that he quite enjoyed the agent's macabre wit. Bond used his humour as a weapon, making vicious remarks that would cut anyone else into pieces. Q, however, gave as good as he got and refused to bow down under the learned intimidation technique. In return, 007 seemed to… soften, almost. He was still arrogant, still manipulating and cold, but after a rather panicked exchange with R, the omega realised that Bond was at least attempting to act vaguely human whenever he was around Q.
Needless to say, R was not impressed.
She was also somewhat scared.
Q tried not to dwell on that too much.
After the disaster that was Shanghai, Bond returned under a hail of metaphorical bullets and Q finally saw first-hand what Bill had meant when he'd said M's bite was worse than her bark. Throughout the entire scolding, however, the man remained calm and collected, one hand in his suit pocket and a slight smirk on his face.
The man was seemingly unflappable.
He didn't see Bond again until the man strolled into the TSS branch, prowled right up to Q's desk, and handed him a slightly battered laptop. His presence caused heads to turn, and the Quartermaster was somewhat amused to find that other MI6 employees were coming up with excuses to come down to their lair just to see the supposedly-dead nightmare of a man for themselves.
Being perfectly honest, Q himself wasn't all that… unaffected by the charming alpha's presence, but he angrily shoved those thoughts away because the last thing he needed was to accidentally out himself as an omega right now when there was a psychopath wanting M's head on a stick.
Still though.
He couldn't help but give a little smirk when Bond asked if he could get past the fail safes in Silva's laptop. Get past them?
"I invented them".
The ex-double-0's code was still proving to be a challenge, however, and even though there was nothing that Q loved more than a good puzzle, right now, time was of the essence and this fighting-back-rubix-cube-disaster was starting to get a little annoying.
"Stop" Bond suddenly said, "Go in on that".
The Quartermaster frowned but did as asked, zooming into that particular line of code and-
"Granborough road. It's an old tube station on the Metropolitan line; been closed for years… Use that as a key".
Q distantly wondered if MI6 had any idea just how intelligent 007 really was.
"Oh look, it's a map!"
"It's London. Subterranean London".
Not just smart, but apparently with an eidetic memory too.
The Quartermaster smiled, finding that he was liking this confusing alpha more and more by the second, and then-
Then it all went to hell.
"Q? I need help".
Oh, and weren't those words just music to his ears.
"I'm tracking the car, where are you going?"
"I've got M. We're about to disappear" Bond replied, casual as you please.
"What?"
"I need you to lay a trail of breadcrumbs impossible to follow for anyone except Silva. Think you can do it?"
And wasn't that just a blatant challenge?
"I'm guessing this isn't strictly official?"
"Not even remotely".
Q started to grin and quickly hid his expression behind his cup of earl grey.
"So much for my promising career in espionage".
Bill, blessed Bill, brought Carlsberg and conversation. Q had sent the rest of TSS home hours ago, knowing that word of what he was doing couldn't afford to get out, and the last thing he wanted was to ask his workers to lie for him.
So instead, he called Bill.
"But do you think even Silva will be able to spot that?"
His omegian side preened at the compliment.
"He's the only one who could".
Tanner nodded and turned around, but a split second later, his entire face paled.
"Sir".
Fuck.
Q stopped his typing and slowly turned to follow his gaze.
Gareth Mallory, Chairman of the Intelligence and Security Committee, stood directly behind him with his arm in a sling and a resigned look on his face.
The Quartermaster still wasn't quite sure what to make of the man. He was an alpha, that much was obvious, but similar to M, he wore that badge quietly and unassumingly, despite the raw power that lurked underneath. Currently, he was acting as an intermediary between MI6 and the British government which sounded harmless enough, but last Q heard, he was also trying to strongarm M into early retirement.
"What are you doing?"
"We're just… monitoring-"
"-creating a false tracking signal for Silva to follow".
"Well, sir-" Bill started, giving Q a panicked look, and the omega quickly turned back to Mallory. "What are we- uh- no-"
"Excellent thinking".
What.
"Get him isolated".
What.
"Send him on the A9. It's the direct route, you can monitor his progress more accurately and confirm it with the traffic cameras".
"But, sir, what if the PM finds out?"
Mallory shrugged.
"Then we're all buggered. Carry on".
The alpha turned and started to walk away, and Q couldn't help but smile as he glanced back at Bill, who was looking more confused than amused.
Most alphas still held outdated views about omegas and "what they're good for", and despite the fact Q knew that there was no way in hell Mallory could know that he wasn't a beta, he still had a good feeling about the man.
For now, though, he had a different alpha to worry about, and something told him that this breadcrumb trail of his wasn't going to end peacefully.