Night Duty
Q slowly roamed the halls of MI6, ears still ringing from the explosions, hands trembling from shock and stress, and both shoulders aching something fierce. He knew that he should go to medical, knew that he should have listened to the paramedics on Westminster Bridge, knew that he should be doing a lot of things right now rather than wandering the depths of the Old Vic Tunnel with the sounds of Vauxhall's demolition and the sight of James bloody Bond disappearing with Dr Swann playing in his mind on repeat.
Finally reaching TSS, he swiped his miraculously still-intact keycard and stepped into the dark room. He had barely moved forward two feet before there was a faint click and the lamp on his workstation lit up, casting a dark shadow over the stranger currently standing in front of it.
Q stopped, stared, and then sighed.
Because of fucking course his life was just that fucked up for him to be kidnapped or injured or killed in the middle of MI-fucking-6 right after he'd fucking saved the world and then returned alone to the only fucking place that he fucking felt fucking safe.
"Quartermaster".
The voice was low, rough, more of a rumble than anything else, and Q frowned as he tried to place it.
"You don't exactly look like much, now do you?" the stranger continued, "How the fuck does Mallory except you to keep us safe?"
Which-
"Ah" Q said, resigned, "003, I presume?"
"Fuck, how old even are you?" the man growled, "There's no fucking way that you're experienced enough to keep us alive!"
He took that as a yes. 005 had warned him, after all, that this particular double-0 leaned more towards using his fists than his brain.
Q shook his head and then immediately regretted the action as it left him dizzy and swaying on the spot. Christ, he needed some tea. And probably bandages, too.
"Are you even fucking listening to me?"
"My apologies, Mr Fortier, but tonight has… really not been fun".
"What? Can't handle a little pressure, boffin?"
Q started to feel his temper flare at the blatant disregard this stupid bloody alpha was giving him and seriously, he had been awake far too long to deal with this right now.
"That's Quartermaster boffin to you, 003".
"No. No you're fucking not. My Quartermaster is dead! As is M, apparently" Fortier snarled, "I finally return to London and I find that the entire fucking place is full of poor fucking substitutes!"
Q felt his legs start to tremble and realised that he was about three minutes away from collapsing, only a wave of pure anger and annoyance and fucking done-ness keeping him upright.
"Well then I'm sorry I don't live up the mantel, but quite frankly 003, that's a bit fucking rich coming from you! Where the hell were you for the last two months? For the disaster at Skyfall? Silva, Blofeld, Nine Eyes? Where the fuck were you when I was trying to keep this entire bloody organisation afloat and my agents alive when I only had eleven workers because the other twenty-eight were fucking blown up in front of me?!" Q snarled back, starting to stride towards the fucking twat on unsteady legs, "So if you're so bloody invincible then what the fuck were you doing in Siberia of all fucking places while this poor fucking substitute saved the entire fucking world fucking twice in two fucking months?!"
He stumbled to a stop right in front of the furious alpha, only now realising just how tall and muscular he was, and also how his own head was starting to spin as he gasped for breath.
003, on the other hand, looked almost… worried?!
"What the fuck happened to you?"
Q frowned. "What?"
But the double-0 wasn't meeting his gaze anymore, instead, he was looking him up and down, looking somewhat horrified.
"Were you fucking mugged?"
The omega gave a bark of laughter.
"No, 003, I was most certainly not mugged. Although I have to admit that a mugging almost sounds preferable to hacking into the terrorist organisation being run by the Joint Intelligence Service in the back of a SUV while being shot at, but such is life.
The man's grey eyes widened slightly as he no doubt put two and two together.
"Didn't you fucking get checked out by medical?!"
"Medical and I do not get along".
"Well, maybe you should fucking change that!"
Q paused and gave him a slightly odd look, confused by the drastic change in attitude the agent had just gone through.
"While your concern is appreciated, 003, and more than a little baffling, it really is just a scratch".
"That doesn't look like just a fucking scratch".
Q followed his gaze and blinked, surprised. His entire right shoulder and most of his sleeve was drenched in blood, and he distantly wondered just how he'd managed to wave the paramedics away when he looked like he'd just stepped out of a horror movie.
"Oh… No, that would be a bullet wound".
"What?!"
Q waved him off, beyond tired. "It's just a graze, Mr Fortier. A rather deep one, unfortunately, but there's no actual bullet stuck inside me so it'll be fine".
003 was staring at him like he'd just confessed to being the Queen of England.
"... You're a fucking strange little thing, aren't you?"
He bristled at the not-quite insult. "I am not little".
"But you are strange?"
Q gave the man a disparaging look. "We work for MI6, Mr Fortier. We're both strange".
"... Duncan" he suddenly said, rather gruffly.
"What?"
"We might as well be on a fucking first name basis, Quartermaster, especially since I'm about to get my fucking hands bloody".
"You- what?"
The alpha rolled his eyes before stepping around him and walking silently towards the door.
"Come on".
"What? No! Where? Why?"
Fortier - Duncan - glanced over his shoulder with just the barest hint of a smile.
"Just because you won't see a fucking doctor, Q, doesn't mean that you don't need medical attention. And despite what you may think, not all of us double-0s are as fucking useless as Bond or Trevelyan when it comes to first aid… Come on. There's a kit in the fucking locker room".
The omega stared after him for a moment, beyond confused. He was… actually going to help him? Rather than kill him? Not that Q thought 003 would, at least, not here, where there was an abundance of cameras, but-
He sighed.
You know what? This day was already so fucking weird…
"Quartermaster?"
Q blinked, and then followed the alpha out of TSS.
Since the physical standards that MI6 held the double-0s to was far above the norm, the organisation was keen to keep their training supervised and subtle. As a result, HQ had a large state-of-the-art gym that agents could go to, both to increase their strength but also to unwind. And since alphas were territorial by nature - and the double-0s were far far worse - each agent was given their own personal closet in the brightly lit locker room next to the showers. And they tended to get real tetchy whenever someone touched their stuff.
Which hopefully explained Q's surprise and slight horror at the sight of 003 yanking open the metal door that was clearly labelled '006'.
"Um… Should you be doing that?"
"Trevalyan won't be back for another few weeks" Duncan replied, rooting around in the locker, "I'll have it fucking replaced by then".
"Have what replace- oh".
003 held up the litre bottle of vodka in triumph. Q stared.
"... Does 006 always keep spirits in his locker?"
"006 keep spirits fucking everywhere".
Carefully placing the bottle on the bench next to the Quartermaster, Duncan opened the worryingly large first aid bag he'd pulled out from his own closet, and unpacked a sterile pair of scissors.
"I hope you aren't too fucking fond of that shirt, Quartermaster".
"Not as fond as I am of living".
Duncan gave a slight upwards quirk of his lips - it was seemingly the closest the man could get to a smile - and started cutting. Q winced as strips of red fabric were pulled away from the wound that scored his shoulder blades, and tried to focus on his breathing instead.
"Well, you were right about there being no bullet" Fortier said, gently prodding at the wound, "But this is going to need a fuck ton of stitches".
Q gave a rather disgruntled pout and to his surprise, the man huffed a laugh. Once. Just one laugh. Very quickly. It looked like it might have hurt.
"You know Q, I've got a feeling that you're just as fucking adverse to medical as your agents are. Whatever happened to leading by example?"
"Do as I say and not as I do" he quipped, "How good are you at stitches?"
Duncan smirked and held up the bottle of vodka with blood-stained fingers.
"How good are you at drinking?"
The Quartermaster considered his options. On one hand, he could just suck it up and go to hospital where they had actual trained doctors and the good stuff to make the pain go away, but on the other hand, those actual trained doctors tended to be dynamicist pricks half the time, and he really didn't want to sit through another lecture about overusing scent blockers right now. At least here he didn't have to worry about Duncan asking about his dynamic, because the man literally did not need to know in order to stitch him up. Vodka was a poor substitute for anesthetic but quite frankly, Q could do with a fucking drink after the day he'd had, and it was better to get drunk here with a double-0 to look out for him than it was to pass out alone in his apartment.
Decision made, he reached out, grabbed the bottle, and undid the cap. Holding it up with shaking hands, Q downed a large mouthful, immediately coughing and spluttering as the clear liquid burned his throat. Duncan grinned as he took the bottle from him and took his own swig, with zero side effects at all the absolute bastard.
Q glared at him.
"I thought surgeons were supposed to have steady hands?"
003 took another, larger sip.
"Why do you think I'm drinking?"
The passed the bottle back and forth until Q's head was pleasantly fuzzy and his entire body felt more tingly than painful. Only half of the vodka remained, and after carefully moving the suturing kit out of harm's way, Duncan poured most of what was left over the Quartermaster's shoulders and right arm. Q automatically flinched, despite not feeling much of anything right now, and 003 softly shushed him under his breath. Threading the tiny needle held carefully in the metal forceps, Duncan turned the omega away from him and started stitching.
Q knew that he should feel pain, his death grip on the almost empty vodka bottle was proof of that, but all he could notice was the very strange feeling of tugging skin and the tightness that the polymer stitches were leaving behind.
They sat there in silence for what simultaneously felt like seconds and hours to Q's alcohol-hazy brain. Once the sutures were done, Duncan found a pair of tweezers to pull out the tiny shards of glass embedded in Q's right arm and the side of his face. Finishing that, the man briefly returned to the first aid bag to carefully cover the spindly black stitches that now stretched across Q's right shoulder blade to the midpoint of his back.
"I'll put proper bandages on them after you shower, and on your arm, too" the alpha said, leaning back, "You're fucking lucky that none of that glass moved closer to your eyes, considering that you already have shit eyesight".
"Uh, fuck you".
"Hmm, maybe when you're sober".
A distant part of Q's mind felt outraged and mortified at the quick response, but the rest of his brain was still pleasantly fuzzy, and when Duncan carefully pulled him to his feet, he just went along with it. Carefully prising finally-steady fingers away from the vodka bottle was slightly more difficult, but the double-0 agent managed that too, and a few moments later, Q found himself standing in the middle of the shower room with nothing but his trousers and blood-speckled glasses
"Wash up, Quartermaster. There's a towel just inside the door and I'll see you when you come back out".
Q did as told, his tongue oddly numb but the rest of his body warm and buzzing. The shower worked wonders, both for sobering him up as well as relaxing his tense muscles after a day, week, month, two months of non-stop stress and panic. The pain was starting to creep back in, but he'd expected that, and he also knew that there was a pack of extra-strong Paracetamol somewhere in his desk drawer. He already knew that he wouldn't be getting much sleep tonight, and just the thought of lying down on fresh stitches was agonising, so he might as well spend another few hours at HQ and get some of the post-world-ending-disaster-averted paperwork done.
Blindly stumbling his way back to the door, he roughly towel-dried his hair, already regretting the frizziness he knew that he was subjecting his curls to. Putting back on his glasses, he gave his blood-stained trousers a disdainful look before wrapping the towel around himself. It was surprisingly large and fluffy, and even when he carefully pulled it around his shoulders, the ends reached his knees. He kept a spare suit in his office for those days when he had to pretend that he went home or else face a lecture from R, so all he had to do now, was ask Duncan to bandage the worst of the cut along his arm, and then awkwardly shuffle down the cold tunnels and hope he didn't run into anyone.
Stepping back out into the locker room, he felt himself shiver slightly. 003 was already sitting on the same wooden bench, cleaning and packing away the suture kit.
"You know, you really didn't have to do this. Not that it isn't appreciated, of course, but I just thought that-"
Duncan growled.
Duncan growled and glared and looked absolutely fucking livid.
The Quartermaster froze, recognizing that low pitch snarl and the flash in the man's eyes and the way his hands gripped the roll of bandages far too tightly for him to feeling anything other than fury.
What. the. fuck.
Q frantically thought back over the last few minutes, analysing everything that he did and didn't do and said and didn't say but there was nothing - there was fucking nothing - that he could think of that would cause this reaction in the alpha. He'd done as he asked; he'd sat there as the sutures were put in place, he'd gone into the shower room and kept the stitches as dry as possible, he washed and cleaned and scrubbed the blood off of his arms and shoulders and neck and-
Oh.
Oh no.
He'd showered.
Q had showered and then he hadn't reapplied his scent blocker.