[ It's nighttime, no matter how you look at it or where you look at it from. But the thing is -- or rather, the important thing, as there will always be a hundred things battling for attention, few of which are ever important -- that they both gave up the pretense of 9 tp 5 long ago. And so, in the end, the fact that it is nighttime for the both of them really means very little in the grand scheme of things, and M is still waiting on the line. Ring, ring, double-oh-seven. ]
[ He doesn't keep her waiting long. (Not that he wouldn't — there are a few things one is allowed to embrace in international waters, and one of them is the ability to be petulant about some things, if the fancy strikes.) Bond picks up on the third or fourth ring; he's in transit, tucked away in the back of a cab. ]
Am I being rerouted? [ No inflection one way or the other; just plain. He's in Bolivia for a bloody reason. ]
[ No inflection, maybe, but asking the question is a statement in itself. She'd like to think that in the old days they didn't have any of that. They had a knowable, identifiable enemy to fight and that kept the urge to backtalk in line. But that wouldn't be the truth. The truth is there have always been and will always be agents like Bond and if they weren't so good at what they did, they would be bloody intolerable.
She refuses to pinch the bridge of her nose, resting her fingers all in a line on the top of her desk where she can keep an eye on them instead. ]
Do you really think it would be me calling if that's all it was?
If wishes were horses, beggars would ride, [ he intones, though there is a curious thread on the uplift of it, equal parts needling joke and boyhood lesson. In the background: a burst of a car-horn, fragments of angry Spanish from the middle-aged cab driver. Bond exhales, annoyed, like some cosmic mirror of M's own struggle.
There is, of course, a small multitude of things he could infer from the fact that it is M calling him directly. None of those possibilities feel particularly life-threatening, however, so he skips a reference point or two in favor of: ]
I do hope you're not asking me to RSVP to that Christmas party.
[ There is much to infer here. If there was a great danger -- or, more privately, if she had any real doubts as to 007's chance of success -- she wouldn't waste time on trivial things like permitting herself to rise to Bond's nature. That she is says as much about the current state of his mission as she plans to at the moment.
--it's a bit like dangling a piece of meat in front of tiger, really. There's no question what the tiger will do, because it is a tiger, after all. The part that sustains a persons's curiosity lies more in the how. All these years of knowing Bond now, and there's still some satisfaction to be taken from dangling a piece of meat in front of his face. ]
Of course not, [ she says, mild, matter-of-fact. ] I had you removed from the guest list years ago.
[ Meat. Tiger. It doesn't matter who or what, as long as the animal has a taste for blood — or, more accurately, as long as you keep it hungry. (For what, as always, depends on where you're unleashing him.) Bond exhales a laugh, a huff that could be and should be much louder if he lets it. It's a noble thought, that a double oh wouldn't show up just because a list forbade him. It's not as if he has the courtesy to pretend like he doesn't keep track of her various living arrangements.
Bond sounds thoughtful when he replies, the way some recall passing cipher keys or the GPS co-ordinates for underground weapons caches. ]
It's not the proverbial bullets you should spend your time worrying about, 007.
[ Not that she can worry about him and either sort if she's to do her job. No one left behind, you can tell yourself. The things we do we do to keep our agents safe, to bring them home, to keep us all safe. But start to worry about them each, as individuals, rather than as a the whole, the idea, and it would be harder to send them out to do what had to be done. She'd seen others make that mistake during her time out east, but she never would. ]
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no subject
no subject
Am I being rerouted? [ No inflection one way or the other; just plain. He's in Bolivia for a bloody reason. ]
no subject
She refuses to pinch the bridge of her nose, resting her fingers all in a line on the top of her desk where she can keep an eye on them instead. ]
Do you really think it would be me calling if that's all it was?
no subject
There is, of course, a small multitude of things he could infer from the fact that it is M calling him directly. None of those possibilities feel particularly life-threatening, however, so he skips a reference point or two in favor of: ]
I do hope you're not asking me to RSVP to that Christmas party.
no subject
--it's a bit like dangling a piece of meat in front of tiger, really. There's no question what the tiger will do, because it is a tiger, after all. The part that sustains a persons's curiosity lies more in the how. All these years of knowing Bond now, and there's still some satisfaction to be taken from dangling a piece of meat in front of his face. ]
Of course not, [ she says, mild, matter-of-fact. ] I had you removed from the guest list years ago.
no subject
Bond sounds thoughtful when he replies, the way some recall passing cipher keys or the GPS co-ordinates for underground weapons caches. ]
Then I've dodged the proverbial bullet at last.
no subject
[ Not that she can worry about him and either sort if she's to do her job. No one left behind, you can tell yourself. The things we do we do to keep our agents safe, to bring them home, to keep us all safe. But start to worry about them each, as individuals, rather than as a the whole, the idea, and it would be harder to send them out to do what had to be done. She'd seen others make that mistake during her time out east, but she never would. ]
Your timeline's just grown shorter.