Title: The Train Meet
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: No Warnings Apply
Fandom: James Bond
Relationships: ames Bond/Q
Tags: Meet Cute, Getting Together, Fluff
Summary: It wasn't the way that James thought he would meet his future.
Word Count: 3,456
Beta: Grammarly



James hadn't taken the train back to MI6 in a very long time. There was no reason for him to get back quickly, and with the cargo he was transporting, it was best for it not to be on a plane, and with James' broken leg and his shoulder messed up, it was hard for him to drive. He would settle it all at the end of the journey and get some time off. It would be better if fewer people saw it.

There was also the issue that some were still people who were coming after the device. Only idiots would come and get the device with three different MI6 agents guarding it. Of course, that didn't mean that no one was stupid enough to go after them. James had caught one so far. Alec had taken care of it.

"So what is this thing?" Tanner asked as he tapped the case.

"Some kind of device that was never supposed to leave MI5, but it did, and now the whole damned world is after it."

"And the person who made it?" Alec asked as he came into the room on the train.

"M wouldn't give me that. We didn't expect this much fervor around it. So, we have a lot of people just going after it and no idea what it does. There are a lot of idiots in the world, and I wouldn't mind taking that quota down by a few of them. We have another stop in fifty minutes, don't we?"

Tanner rubbed at his eyes. "Yes"

"The device was made by an asset that M is trying to pure into MI6; after this, I have a feeling that it won't be too hard to lure them into MI6 after they find out that we are the ones who recovered it."

"Is that why M sent all of us?" Alec pulled one of his knives and looked at James for a few seconds before looking at Tanner.

"Yes. She wants this in our hands so no one can ever take it away. Of course, things also were just a little different, given that we have no idea what this thing does. There is talk of it, and M said that the less I knew, the better; the lesser you two knew, the better as well."

"We do go where she says all the time."

Alec tapped the case with the knife and pressed it a little too hard; the lock opened, and the case was empty.

"Shite," Alec said.

"You are a master of the understatement, Alec," James said. He frowned.

"We have little time to make sure this person doesn't leave with it. Tanner, can you tell us what it looks like?"

"No, M didn't share that with me."

James was limited in what he could do without drawing attention to all of them. He could take a stroll through the train and see where the most activity was and hang around there to keep an eye on things. "You two look into the cabins and everything else, and I'll see about keeping an eye on people in general. I'll get a drink in the main car, and we can go from there."

Neither Tanner nor Alec fought him on that. They all three got their weapons concealed, and everything was in good shape to make sure they could protect themselves. James reached over and shut the case as well as locked it. Hopefully, that would deter anyone from just making it out of there with it. It wasn't like the person who had it now was the only one who was after it on the train.

The main car was full of people chatting, some who seemed to know each other from taking the ride a good deal together. There was a free table, so James settled in at it and looked at the food and drink options on hand. The food sounded great, and the drink selection was on point. The train was a good one that they were taking. James was a little shocked, given how M liked to stick them in the lowest class possible most of the time.

"Are you ready to order?" a man asked as he came up to the table.

"Yes, I'll have the steak special with whatever cocktail you think would pair the best, no tequila or rum."

"Of course, sir. I'll get that order in and get it to you as soon as possible."

There was a salad with the meal, so he would at least have that to eat and use as a reason to look around while he was chewing.

People came and went, but no one there paid him any attention, even when he looked around and stared at them for several seconds. He wasn't sure that this was a good idea on his part, but he also knew that he would draw too much attention with his broken leg; even if he wasn't using crutches, the cast was horrible.

Tanner was at least the contact between them and M, so he didn't have to tell her this. The last time he had been in the room, he had lifted the case, and it had weight, then he had slept with his leg propped on it, his broken one. It hurt to move, so no one was getting the device without him knowing. It had to be the last time that James had gone wandering with either Tanner or Alec in the room.

He didn't blame them as there was a lot of time that things could have gone wrong, and if it was a full-on attack, it would have ended the same if James had been alone in there. There was a lot of shit that could go wrong in many ways, so there was no blame to be placed.

"There are no other tables. Do you mind if I join you?" a man asked.

James looked up at him. He was lithe and looked nervous as hell. The man pushed his glasses up his face and looked around like he wanted to run.

"Be my guest." James waved for the man to sit down.

It didn't take long for James to figure out he was a boffin of some kind. Every time someone moved behind him, the man flinched.

"My name is James. If you want to move to the inside seat, I'll make sure that no one sits there. I'll even move in some."

The man smiled and scooted in, setting his laptop bag on the seat he had been sitting in. He got the laptop out and got it set up to where he could use it, but it wasn't going to block his sight of James. "Tav. It's a nickname of my formal name, but my parents named me a bloody horrible name that I don't like."

"Tav, it's a pleasure to meet you. I have ordered food and drink. If you have already eaten, it's fine, but I didn't want to eat in front of you without warning."

Tav sitting down with him just might be the best thing possible. He could easily get his broken leg up on the other seat and use it as a reason to look around while talking.

"Do your boyfriends mind you flirting?"

"Boyfriends?"

"Yes, the two men you boarded with. You are all three sharing a single bedroom. It's a large bed, but still."

"It was all there was, and we don't like having different rooms. I'm on the bed, and the other two are on the couch or the floor."

"Business?"

"Heading home from it, and we are very happy to be getting home."

James' phone chimed, so he looked at it. The scanner that they had used the first time to find it was no longer working. Or the device was no longer on the train. James frowned.

"Issue?"

"Just bad news about something, but I can focus on that when I get home. It's not like my boss is going to fire me over something that is not my fault. What do you do for a living?"

"Computers. I build programs. You?"

"I acquire things that people want and give them to them."

"Sounds a little like you might get shot at a little more than you should, Bond."

James nodded, reaching for the drink as the waiter set it down, along with a glass of wine for Tav that Tav never ordered.

Tav was grinning at him.

"You could tell 006 and Tanner to join us, 007. Or I can tell them." Tav set down a phone that was an MI6 issue. He was still grinning.

James did as Tav told him to.

"Of course, you could also call me by the nickname I grew up with since my brothers didn't like calling me by my formal name since it was a mouthful. Q. It helps that I already answer to it. Now, Bond, tell me, how did you lose this?" Q tapped the briefcase, and he cocked an eyebrow.

"You have it?" James kept his eyes on Q as he texted Alec to get Tanner and get to him in the main car.

"Yes. I slipped in and got it just before you came back from the bathroom after your nap. You didn't hear me, but it was a good test of my skills. I've not needed them since my brothers were at home, so they might have gotten rusty."

"M didn't tell us we were getting a new Quartermaster."

"M used this as a reason why I was needed. The case is stupid, and I wish that I had gotten my hands on it after I handed it over to MI5 for transport to MI6. I thought that they were going to do more than stick it in a veritable suitcase. There are two men in a broom closet in the last first-class car. I broke the lock so that no one could get into it. They will not wake up for a while as I was prepared to take everyone, even you three, out."

"Why didn't you?"

"Because I thought that maybe doing that would make it hard for you to trust me as your Quartermaster if I did that. So I went with seeing where you slotted me in as not a threat."

"I'll make sure to never do that again."

"Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, you would be right, but that one could be your death."

"I'm learning that."

James saw Q react to the door opening and Tanner coming through. He picked up his briefcase and moved it to where it would be a barrier between him and Tanner.

"Tanner, have a seat over here with me; I would rather have 006 and 007 in line of sight."

"Who are you?"

"Tanner, meet MI6's new quartermaster. He is the one that lifted the device from us. He did it while I was in the bathroom, slipping through the few bobby traps I did that no one would have been able to catch."

"I see. Well, Alec's on his way. He had gone to check the kitchen car, just in case."

---

James opened his door, tired from the therapy to get him back into the field. His leg was healed; now there was the work to get where he could run and fight on it again.

The smell of potatoes and spice of some kind told James that someone was in there. It wasn't a smell of food that James had ever smelled before when it came to Alec breaking into his place to cook because Alec had no food. It still made no sense to James, but he loved the man like a brother.

The jingle of a bell made James stop. He looked down to see a cat staring up at him. It was long-haired and would blend in with the darkness, given how dark his black fur was.

Behind the black one was the opposite, a pure white cat who had no bell on its collar.

"Ozma and Mombi. Mombi likes to sneak up on people. I thought that him sneaking up on you might not be a good thing, hence the bell."

"And why are they here?" James shut the door and saw that there was luggage in his living room.

"Well, I share a building with Alec. He left food on the hob and then went out. There was no fire damage, but it will be a while before the smoke leaves my place, and I will not subject my cats to that. Tanner's working on a new place for us and cleaning service, but I needed a place to stay until then."

"And so you just thought that you could just come here?"

"You told me to stay the last time you took me here to screw me blind."

James couldn't fault Q for that. He knew from the start that Q had a different way of looking at a lot of things. He was able to slip in and do things that no one else was able. He could pass by, and no one see him. After arriving back in London, Q had made a mockery of the other Double-Ohs, who hadn't seen him as a threat. It had amused James to no end.

Q was a threat on many levels. He couldn't hold his own in a fight with Double-Ohs unless he could drug or poison one, but in other areas, he was good. Sneaking was his biggest thing. Getting back James' security was another.

James never had anyone break into his place. He was the main deterrent. He always never took work home outside of weapons, so there was no reason to break into his place. No one expected the blunt instrument to have anything. Still, James had a good system. He shouldn't be shocked about Q being able to break in, but he was.

"Are you okay?"

"What are you making?"

"Just fried potatoes. An American friend in uni taught me the way he makes them. There is also a bit of ham and some onions in them."

James went to the kitchen. Watching the way the cats followed him. He didn't want to step on one. That was not the way to go about keeping Q in his life and in his bed. There was something between them, but Q was very, very afraid of commitment. James had learned that the hard way trying to get him to stay for breakfast.

This could be the first step in a good direction with that.

James saw the pan and what was inside of it. It looked rather good. The spices smelled like they all went together, even if, like most things, Q was heavy with the chilis.

It was good that James likes hot things.

"Your brothers still call you Q, don't they?"

"Yes."

"And Tav was a college thing?"

"College and a few lovers. I like it well enough. I was partial to Q even before I became the Quartermaster. Why?"

"Just wondering if the name Tav was something you liked or not."

"You want to use it?"

James shrugged. It was the first name he learned, and even if he started to use Q just as quickly afterward, he wasn't sure what he felt about it.

"That's not an answer."

"I was trying t sound out what you liked best. I never really liked nicknames on James. Alec calls me Jamie sometimes. I don't hate it from him, as he's not trying to pick on me for it. With a name like yours, I understand wanting a nickname. I just don't want you to feel like you aren't getting the right kind of affection with me calling you Q."

"Ah, intimacy. Like when you think I'm asleep and you call me darling."

"I know you aren't asleep. You just never let me do anything like that unless you are tired and post-coital."

"Our parents were never good at affection. They slept in different bedrooms. As far as I am aware, sex was had three times, and we were sprung from that. I don't know anything about it, and I barely pay attention to what others do as my head is elsewhere. I don't mean to be an asshole about it."

"You are not. I guess I never thought much about what you were seeing growing up. My parents were affectionate with each other, and while in public, I'm not one for public displays; I guess that being at home is different. There is also that I am not sure what we are. At least I wasn't until you just came in to live with me."

"Not long term."

Q wasn't looking at James where he had been the moments before.

"You could. I wouldn't mind it. It's not like I am home every single night. I can be gone for up to a month sometimes. We would have to upgrade the security system."

"That was already on my plans. I cannot live in a place like this. There are the cats as well."

"We had a lot of them at Skyfall, the manor I grew up in. There were a lot of them for taking care of rodents and the like. There was one that slept in the bed with me. My father disliked it, but I loved it and convinced the cat to keep on coming to my bedroom at night."

"I've always had a pet. I can understand with your life not having one outside of a fish that you could set up on an auto feeder and leave for weeks at a time and clean the tank when you were back."

"Never been much for doing anything with fish beyond eating them."

Q laughed and turned the knob off before giving the potatoes another stir. He put the lid on it and turned around to face James. "Let's call this a trial, then. I would hate to make you feel like you need to put up with me if you can't stand me here."

"Whatever you want."

Q made a dismissive noise, so James walked over to him, blocking his lover from moving at all. He groaned when Q went to kiss him. James loved nothing more than kissing Q, but that wasn't the goal here.

"Q, no. This is not that. You are allowed to want things."

"I don't know what I want. I don't know what I want to do or what I want to have happen. I just want to learn about things, and the best way is to let you do what you like and figure out if I like it or not. I do tell you when I don't."

"You do. I just want to make sure that you know that even if it's something I really like, I don't want to push you into something you don't like."

"I would never do that." Q leaned in and brushed his nose against James' nose for a few seconds before relaxing back against the cabinets. "Once this had cooled a little, it should be good to eat, we can get the table set and the wine poured. I think it's going to match it well."

"I'm sure it will. Even if not, I drink anything."

Q pushed at James' chest, but James stayed where he was. James waited for Q to actually look him in the eye before he leaned in for the kiss. Q gripped James' shirt and held on tightly. It was so addicting, the way that Q kissed. The first one had been out of nowhere, and James learned that Q had a trigger of danger that was narrowly escaped even if he wasn't the one in danger. It had been a mission for 002, and James had just been on hand while he healed to help get the Double-Ohs the best help possible.

James had thought he would hate it, but in the end, it wasn't bad; the way that Q ended up in his lap in Q's office had made it worth it as well. The teenage years were the last time James had gotten off his clothes like that, but he had enjoyed it and found that the way that Q took affection when like that made it all worth it.

There was something about Q that just drew James in, and he was going to hang on for as long as he could.

What started on that train seemed like it was going to stretch out long in front of them, and James was all here for it.

The End