The rest of their sessions don't differ much. They run, they lift weights, and they use machines that, in Q's opinion, bear striking resemblance to medieval torture devices used in the 1300s. They become less intimidating after a few uses, but Q is positive he'll never desire to use them again once their month of training is over.

The two of them talk very little. Bond favors silence and concentration as he trains, Q quickly discovers, and he is never off standing to the side, watching. He lifts all the same weights that Q does (and then some, of course) and joins alongside Q any time he can. If Bond has to be stuck in a gym all day, the agent isn't going to let it go to waste.

It is during their second week of training that a conversation gets going. Q is bench-pressing—or trying to, at least—as Bond stands nearby, watching and keeping a close eye so that Q doesn't hurt himself. "You never lift weights alone," Bond told him once, "unless you want to get yourself killed."

Q has just finished his third repetition and Bond helps him lift the bar back into its cradle with a slight metal clang. The noise is rather similar to what Q imagines his heart is sounding like right now.

"Shall we call it a day, then?" Q says sort of hopefully—not too optimistic, mind you, because he knows if he sounds too excited, Bond will make him stay an extra hour just to spite him.

"I don't know anything about you," Bond replies abruptly, and Q looks at him with a quirked brow because the revelation comes out of nowhere.

"Oh." He swallows, sits up. There are sweat stains beneath his underarms and a dark V on his chest. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, which is so very un-Q like. "What is it you would like to know?"

He's not wearing his glasses today, which makes it kind of difficult to see Bond clearly—and he is terrified by the prospect of contacts, so don't even bother—but he thinks the agent is frowning at him, just a little.

"Your real name, for starters," the agent replies, and he's now seated himself on the bench opposite Q, hands clasped in between spread thighs. He is leaning forward, seemingly attentive.

"Well," Q says as he pushes an errant curl from his forehead—his hair's gone to hell since this whole thing started—not that it was that impressive before, but. "I'm afraid I don't quite see the relevancy of such—"

"For god sakes," he interrupts. "Forget I asked."

It's not that Q is hesitant about sharing personal information, or is embarrassed by his real name (he is), but he doesn't really engage in small talk, or see a reason for it. He supposes that's why the two of them—thus far— have managed to get along relatively well. Neither of them speaks much, which is just fine by him, because it's not like he has a lot of extra air to use towards engaging in conversation anyway, not when his lungs feel like deflated water balloons on each expiration.

Though reluctant to admit it, Q is actually starting to notice a slight change in his appearance. It's nothing drastic, of course. He hasn't morphed into some tanned beefcake with bulging biceps overnight—but the thought of it causes him to let out a derisive chuckle, though in the winded state he's in, it comes out as a sort of breathless snort through his nose.

He can tell he's gaining some weight though, and his arms are starting to show a little bit more definition. If anything, there's now a constant ache in his joints, a sort of electrical thrum he gets after a hard workout that isn't entirely unpleasant. He comes to expect it now after a day's hard work and anticipates the burn, the pleasant strain of muscles that have been pulled taut.

And, if at the end of every day when he goes home and devours his entire fridge in one sitting, he doesn't tell Bond. The agent doesn't need to know, and he'd only gloat at the fact that Q is eating all the foods Bond instructed him to.

Things change a little bit after that. Bond gets called on a mission—a small one, mind you, and he's only backup, which Q knows he must not be pleased about, though he can't know for sure since Bond didn't exactly tell him he was leaving to begin with.

He's gone for a week, a long, long, torturous week. It'd be easy to fall back into old habits, to eat only one meal a day, to not show up at the gym at all, but he doesn't give into temptation. He doesn't because a part of him wants Bond to know that he can do this without him, that he's capable of being strong and sweaty and manly and stuff without the agent's help.

And he can, he can do it by himself... it's just a lot more boring without him. But the agent's absence and the accompanying silence he leaves in his vacuity gives Q a lot of time to think, think about his time here at MI6, the life he left behind, his first encounter with James Bond—the agent M had spoken about with an almost proud, motherly exasperation.

He wonders if his own mother would speak about him in much the same way, if she could see him now.

"My parents died when I was a child and I have lived within an hour-radius of London all my life. My favorite color is caput mortuum, I am deathly afraid of flying, and I hate peas."

This is what he says to Bond the moment the agent walks through the doors of the gym, back from his week-long absence.

Bond looks at him in that way that Bond does, all narrowed eyes and creased forehead lines. "Caput mortuum?"

"Purple, Mr. Bond. You wanted to know more about me, did you not?"

"I asked for your name," he clarifies, striding past Q with his duffel bag in tow. He's still dressed in a suit, which means he must've just gotten back from his mission and come straight to the gym. That's odd.

Q follows at his heels a bit like an insistent puppy that won't shut up. "My birth name is of no importance. I also enjoy painting. I cannot legally drive, and I deciphered Kryptos in two days."

"Fascinating," Bond deadpans, beginning to unbutton his shirt when they're in the bathroom. "I really feel like I know you on a personal level now."

Q glowers. "I'm also capable of deciphering sarcasm." He decides to seat himself on the bench and faces the other way as Bond strips, providing him privacy. He wants to ask why Bond came straight here after his mission, of all places, but the question feels invasive, somehow, like Q knows the answer is one that Bond doesn't really want to give. "I take it your trip went smoothly?" he asks instead.

He cranes his neck just as Bond is tugging off his shirt, revealing a red, horizontal scar, running beneath the blade of one shoulder and tapering off somewhere along his side. Bond turns a little and smirks at him, eyes humorless.

"What gave you that impression?"

"Perhaps 'smooth' wasn't the correct term," he backtracks. He turns back around to give Bond his privacy, sitting straight-backed as he stares at the brick wall. "You're in one piece, more or less," he tries, hearing the clink of a belt buckle and the whoosh as the belt slips through pant loops. "That means something."

"It means nothing," Bond remarks, and his voice is suddenly much louder when he comes to sit next to Q, though he's facing in the opposite direction. "The mission was defused before I arrived." Q is still staring at the wall as Bond laces on a pair of sneakers.

"And the scar?"

"Clipped by a bike messenger." He huffs. "Are you satisfied?"

"Quite," Q responds. And he is, because M has banned him from returning to work until his training is finished, and he's been left in the dark for weeks on what's going on in MI6, and is positively itching for any information he can get his hands on.

It's silent for a moment as Bond finishes lacing up his running shoes, and when he finishes he turns towards Q and regards his profile. Q smirks, but doesn't look at him.

"Are there still too many spots on my complexion for your tastes?" he asks, because he's thinking about their first meeting and the way Bond looked at him with something like doubt and amusement.

Instead, Bond is serious as he studies him, a flicker of curiosity in his eyes. "Died when you were a child," he says, a question in his words, and Q had forgotten he'd just told him that only minutes ago.

"Car accident. I was five." He lets out a breath. There's a sort of cold detachment to the memory now, because he's thought about it so much that it's made him bitter, though he won't admit to that out loud. "I survived. I always do," he says, a bit cryptically. He'll let Bond figure that one out on his own.

"And MI6?"

Q straightens. Turns to look at him. "Orphans make the best recruits."

Bond tilts his head at him, something like a smile—but not quite—tugging at the corner of his mouth. "I've heard that before," he says, but doesn't elaborate.

And before Q can ask, he's up from the bench and motioning towards the door. "We're going to do something different today."

Author's notes: Caput mortuum (variously spelled caput mortum or caput mortem), also known as Cardinal purple, is the name given to a purple variety of haematite iron oxide pigment, used in oil paints and paper dyes. It was a very popular color for painting the robes of religious figures and important personages (e.g. art patrons). In essence, it's a very putrid shade of purple that errs more on the side of being brown. However, I chose the color as an ode to Ben Whishaw's character in Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, as his character towards the end of the film becomes a reverent and worshiped figure, almost God-like in nature.

"I hate peas" is a line shamelessly taken from Patrick Verona's character, from 10 Things I Hate About You. Because I also hate peas, so why not?

Kryptos is an encrypted sculpture by American artist Jim Sanborn located on the grounds of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Langley, Virginia. Since its dedication on November 3, 1990, there has been much speculation about the meaning of the encrypted messages it bears. Of the four messages, three have been solved, with the fourth remaining one of the most famous unsolved codes in the world.

Sorry for not updating for a year, guys. Next chapter won't take nearly as long, I promise. If you're still there, I'd love to hear from you.