#minor tanner x 001

[pollyna]

James' pain goes one, two, three, one, two, three.

One-

he's in the middle of the Syrian Desert, it's forty degrees, he lost his gun and R is the last link he has with MI6. His handler in Damascus was dead before he even arrived in his hotel, but the mission goes on, doesn't matter what happens. It's almost mid-morning and his bones absorbs the warmth and nothing hurts. He hasn't slept in seventy-two hours, and he drank the last bottle of water two hours ago. He never felt more alive.

Two-

he's back home, the flat is clean, the fridge is full, the report is written and Medical can rest until the next mission. He does have to take two pills three times a day for the next week, but he can go back to the armoury and try the new rifles Q-Branch had developed while he was away whenever he wants. He sleeps three hours, and he has to bit his cheek so hard to not cry or call out for some kind of help. He was doing so well, no pain at all, just the bliss of meds putting him down. He counts back all the ceramic tiles, from the bathroom door to the windows and then back. Furthermore, he takes two pills at three in the morning, sits on the floor, and then he's lying on it, and he wants to scream until collapse because everything hurts, but London is quiet behind the window of his flat, and so he stays.

Three-

her hairs are red, and she smells like Paco Rabanne, her hands are small and warm against his chest. He doesn't remember her name, but neither does she. It's Russia, it's almost New Year and who should be dead is dead, Alec is back in England and his best suit is in his hotel room. She picked him up in a bar, while he was drinking his second pint, and they end up dancing on some remix of an American song, between other people, and she is kissing his lips while someone is kissing his neck. The hand of the newly arrived is big and a little callous, and it explores half of his back before kissing the red head too. It's humid as hell in the pub and outside the pub, Bond isn't drunk as would like to be, it is snowing, and his knees does the oldest of its weird noises. He still has the strength to pick her up and let the stranger pick them both up. Nothing hurts.

One-

he's walking home after his morning run and Q is sitting outside his door, wearing a brown cardigan in the middle of May and looking like he slept even less than Bond. He smiles and tells him he's going to take them out for breakfast before James can ever ask if something is happened. Q hugs him, and he's sweaty and a little cold, but his Quartermaster doesn't let him go. His left shoulder is begging him to take a shower, and he needs something strong because the last meters actually seemed like miles and his legs bones are going to let him fall any seconds now. It rained all night and the air is chill against his skin, but Q's hand is warm in his, and putting a foot in front of the other doesn't feel so painful any more. It's painful, and it makes Bond grind his teeth, but seeing Q laughing is worth it.

Two-

M put him on babysitter duty with 001 and Eve because this one is big boss and if they catch him it could be war all over again. Sometimes James asks himself if humanity will ever stop, stop fighting themselves and between themselves, but then he remembers he surely doesn't give a fuck because today is one of his almost-okay-days, 001 has one of Tanner's muffin for him and Eve isn't talking about her boyfriend or her girlfriends. Carlos seems like a nice guy for someone who slaughter half a dozen of his opponents families, but again, James as one job and one job only. After that, he can go home and sleep his not-so-acute-pain away in a nice glass of scotch and soft sheets. Maybe, if he's lucky, Q will already be in bed.

Three-

old M used to say, sometimes laughing and sometimes with her stern and concerned look, that he always bit more than he could chew, and he thinks, sitting on a new couch, in his old flat, that this time he has really taken a bite a bit too big. Retirement, or what everyone calls his week off before coming back to MI6 to work with the new recruits and Q-Branch, is making him wanting to try something different because after two days at home he wants to climb the first wall tall enough to actually present some kind of challenge. It's a blissful period of no pain at all, doesn't matter how many furniture edges the bumps in or how the weather is. It makes him full of a different kind of energy and, for the first time in a while, he decides he could cook and text Q to see if he's free to take a lunch break? He doesn't even know if he has something in the fridge or in the pantry, but it's only ten in the morning, and he has all the time to go and buy what he needs. Maybe retirement is really more than he could ever think to chew, but he never said no to a real and potential dangerous mission, so why start now?

(James' pain goes one, two, three, one, two, three, forget and repeat. Sometimes it's the scars, sometimes his shoulder or knee or his head. Pain comes and goes, doesn't matter if the sun shines or all the rain the sky can produce is purring on him. Sometimes having Q hugging him does marvels, and sometimes it is just nice to feel the skin-to-skin contact, but otherwise it changes little. Routine helps, and talking about it, with the rest of the double-division, does is trick too. James waltzes on its time and, after a while, he learns how to let it waltzes to his own. And it becomes just another aspect of his life, not something that controls it.)

on ao3 now.

[pollyna]

headcanon and a little pre-hc: 004 and Eve went through the Double-Ohs training together. Tammy made it, Eve didn't. They were together for a little while, now they're mostly friends. And the magic 001xTanner for no reason at all.

Q hears 004 say if when she's waving at Eve, before going to Uzbekistan. 006 and 009 are there too and no one seem capable of moving after that two little letters. One hour later every double-oh is in the breaking room, nine tumbler on the table, eight of them watching the ceiling and one of them watching the table. The glasses stay there for an entire month and sometimes Q catches Eve at the table, looking at the the fourth, empty, glass.

001 is the second person who says it, Tanner is in Q-Branch with them because M wants a report on a prototype and he says if I come back, as answer to Q when you get back. The Chief of Staff is putting the first of the nine glasses in the same positions of the fourth. 004 is still out there but now, sitting around that table isn't just Eve.

Two months after Tammy is declared missing and dead at the end of that month and Richard comes home with more bruises and broken bones than whole ones. 001's glass comes back looking at the ceiling, 004 ones disappears the day of her funeral.

After that is 006 who says it and then 002, two glasses and it seems everyone is holding is breath in MI6.

Q would like not to know about this little rituals of them because now, everytime he hears one of them say if he knows it could be the last time he sees them at all. The worst thing at all is that every double-ohs is so quiet and peaceful about going on a suicide mission knowing they couldn't come back. Just as if they were taking a walk in the park, nothing new or old about it.

006 comes back the day M chooses the new 004 and Alec takes Eve out for a drink or maybe ten. Simon is a smart guy, smiles maybe a little too much and does his job just a little too well. 003 is the only one who seems to like him.

007 never says if. He says when, he laughs at maybes and, two years after Skyfall he kisses Q's worries away while he's packing his bag. Even if he doesn't say it sometimes, during some particular operations Q finds himself sitting around a the table, looking at all the glasses and trusting Bond he won't ever had to take 007's glass away from the red surface.