bakerstreet | quote, unquote.

[ ooc; info. preference for a fantasy/appropriate historical setting (she's modelled around ancient greece and rome, but any ancient-ish world will do, possibly medieval), though i'm willing to discuss anything except modernization. f/f for shipping, wide open to gen. no smut. ]

WAR AND PEACE, Leo Tolstoy
"What is wrong? What is right? What must one love, what must one hate? What is life for, and what am I? What is life? What is death? What force controls it all?" he asked himself. And there was no answer to one of these questions, except one illogical reply that was in no way an answer to any of them. That reply was: "One dies and it's all over. One dies and finds it all out or ceases asking."

THE PROBABLE FUTURE, Alice Hoffmann
There was a flicker of what there had once been between them. But it was just that, a flicker, nothing more. They had become more like people who'd been through a war together, comrades with little in common but the battle itself.

DEATH OF KINGS, Bernard Cornwell
There are seasons of our lives when nothing seems to be happening, when no smoke betrays a burned town or homestead and few tears are shed for the newly dead. I have learned not to trust those times, because if the world is at peace then it means someone is planning war.

Or bring your own!

1. «And I laughed as if it were funny, and not sad and true.» (Kate Karyus Quinn, Another Little Piece)

2. «And then I was sad; not purely sad, more murkily so. I felt as if there was nothing to count on or touch, nothing except echoes and shadows and disappearances.» (Martine Murray, The Slightly True Story of Cedar B. Hartley)

3. «God knows what I love about you, but whatever it is, you don’t deserve it.» (Magda Szabo, The Door)

4. «It isn’t enough to say I loved him, I adored him. And I don’t know why I write that in the past tense, for I love him still.» (Marcel Proust)

5. bring your own!

Edited 2023-02-13 19:54 (UTC)

We can best help you to prevent war not by repeating your words and following your methods but by finding new words and creating new methods. Virginia Woolf

[They were introduced, briefly, on Gabriel's visit to SIS; it was barely a hello, Agent, Quartermaster, and then nothing for almost three weeks.

Gabriel is back in London; he should be contacting someone from Langley. He could contact M, but the truth is he doesn't know how deep the current...mess that he's in goes. Langley. M. The double-0s are probably clear. His analysts are also probably clear.

But probably has never been good enough.]

Are you free for dinner?

Edited 2023-02-15 23:41 (UTC)

[This is not a number Q just has in his phone. This is a number Q stares at for a long time in hopes of recognising, and finally runs through MI6's contact database as a last resort before gaining a near hit.

The CIA use service phones with a similar base number. The endings change. There's only been one CIA liason he's been involved with in recent history.

One that has no reason to be asking him on a date.

(Of course it's not that, but what reason would there be for anything?).

So it's some time before this one word response.]

Where?

[This is a man who has not been on a date in years, let alone a date in London, but anyway.]

Brat, in Shoreditch.

[He's literally walking by it, which is why he suggests it.]

Edited 2023-02-16 01:02 (UTC)

[How did you-

Why

Typed and then deleted. He almost asks if the name's suppose to sound pointed. Q looks at a desk full of work he could stay late into the night for and still not complete, and then up at the clock.]

Yes, all right. Around 40 minutes?

[It takes time to get from Vauxhall across town.]

An hour.

[He needs to grab a shower first; mostly because he just got off transport. He pays for a room under an alias at a nearby hotel, takes a shower, looks longingly at the bed, takes a moment to buy a new tie, and slips into the restaurant 59 minutes after he hits send text.

He spots Q, gently takes his arm by the elbow.]

I appreciate you meeting me here.

[Oh and now they're arm in arm. That's - novel, for someone he's barely on nodding terms with, and it makes him more sure he's about to hear something he won't enjoy.

A terrible person to go to for cover, he still plays as much of a role as he can, gesturing across the bar.]

Nonsense, we always say we should do something special. And you're right, ordering in loses the romance after a while. We're just over there.

[A quieter corner of the restaurant, out of the main thoroughfare.]

[God, he really is so bad at this. It's fine; Gabriel can more than make up for it. His smile is remarkably gentle, his hand tender against Q's arm. The trick to making it look real to be comfortable with the cover, and Gabriel is.]

It's so out of the way of your office.

[He says it in a pitch that shouldn't be able to be overheard, with a fondness in his voice that isn't precisely real. A nearby waitress smiles indulgently. They're so cute.

Gabriel turns Q in, just a little, so his face isn't quite as visible to the larger room as they head to a quiet corner of the restaurant. A waiter immediately brings the wine list and the menu, and Gabriel reaches over to take Q's hand as they.

Have a date that is not a date. As soon as the waiter is out of earshot, he says, that same pleasant, tender smile on his face, like they're talking about a romantic getaway to Ibiza or that one time that Gabriel pretended to forget an anniversary, wasn't that funny:]

Someone cloned, then corrupted my phone's data while I was in Prague today. Fed me bad intel.

[Q orders for himself, and lets Gabriel pick the wine, and is somewhat preoccupied throughout by the hand that's keeping hold of his own. It's not that he'd sit there stiff as a board otherwise, although he suspects this is why he's not being given the option -- but casual touches never quite come easily to him, and wouldn't be the first thing he'd think to fake.

Casual touches, in fact, simply don't come around very often at all, and that's why his focus keeps coming back to this one.

Until Gabriel goes on, and Q's glad his back is to the restaurant: impossible to hide the analytical processes that switch on behind his eyes.]

I assume restoring your own phone is of less concern than what's out in the world already?

[He does not let go of Q's hand; his own hand is rough with calluses, because while he doesn't think that Q will bolt, there is a tiny part of him that feels like at least this way he can take his wrist and hold on tight, if need be.

He shouldn't have been worried, because the second a puzzle presents itself he can see: this man won't leave until he's figured it out. Good.]

Already got another phone. So yes. And tracking down the culprit. I think whoever it is is at Langley.

[Which explains why he didn't just call his own people. Q is good, better, but in this world, that isn't enough. He would have gone for loyalty, but there was real worry about that.]

Querido, do you want an appetizer? Jamon iberico like we had in Barcelona.

[Yeah that's the waiter coming by making his tone more syrupy, zero warning.]

[Good god, he's never really gone for accents, and if he were to, he'd never imagine they might be anything close to American. But the particular inflection here, combined with that sudden purr to his tone it's

It's a little distracting.]

Please, order for the both of us. I trust your judgement.

[That and it's a rare day when Q manages a single full meal, if they're to have a discussion here he may as well take advantage of the chance to eat and work. He waits patently until the waiter's shadow vanishes across the floor.]

If you're trying to catch a mole, I hate to advise you that Virginia's full of them. You might as well pop a coin in and pick up a mallet.

[It's the touch of Spanish in his accent, truly. He has that warm little purr, even as he mutters.]

You're not wrong, but I had thought I was aware of all of their...tricks.

[He can feel a headache coming on, although then the waiter is there and he's turning on charm that belies the way he looks when he's scowling, when he's irritated, or when he's just on. It's not smooth; there's a rough edge to it, but it's very appealing just the same.

He orders for the both of them. Waits.]

And generally they're not so bold as to try to take me out at the knees.

[Not literally, Q assumes, though there is a moment where he has to keep himself from looking under the table. And yet he has to wonder what it is that's made this man run to him, of all people.

Vauxhall and Langley are colleagues, certainly, but not friends. There's no reason for Q to be more trustworthy than someone close back home.

And, likewise, no reason Q should take this story at face value. He's well enough aware that anyone wanting to take MI6 out at the knees might well start by aiming at him. So he's cautious. Interested, but cautious.

And, as ever, somewhat blunt.]

Makes one wonder what you might have done to warrant it.

[He could have gone to M. He could have gone right to the top and found help, but frankly, this is already a stressful day. His relationship with M is, at best, harried - they don't particularly get on. It's fine.]

Querido.

[He says it as if that's what he calls him all the time. Q. Querido. Darling.]

I am a man of many talents. One of them is dismantling bad covert work. One of the informants we have in the higher echelons of a criminal organization was arrested, and she's threatening to sing like a bird about men she has no business knowing about.

I suspect someone is covering their bases.

1. I'll never forget the beginning of our falling apart. _{Tahereh Mafi, Unravel Me}

2. Everything is funnier in retrospect. Funnier and prettier and cooler. You can laugh at anything from far enough away. _{Chuck Palahniuk, Stranger Than Fiction}

3. Flirting with madness is one thing; when madness started flirting back, it was time to call the whole thing off. _{Rohinton Mistry, A Fine Balance}

4. The silliest things shatter you. A T-shirt discovered behind the washing machine. A toy that rolled under a cabinet in the garage, forgotten until someone drops something and goes to fetch it, and suddenly they're on the concrete floor sobbing into a dusty baseball mitt. _{Victoria Schwab, The Archived}

5. wildcard!

1.) "I'll walk forever with stories inside me that the people I love most can never hear.": -The Evolution of Mara Dyer
2.) It seemed so natural, to talk to him about odd things. She had never done that before. The trust, so sudden and so complete, and the intimacy, fightened her.: -Americanah
3.) There are few times when we know with absolute certainty we are going to do something for the last time. Life has a way of moving in circles, bringing us back to places we didn't expect and taking us away from those we do. There are too many times we don't pay close enough attention, and moments are lost in our assumption we'll have another chance.: -Tempted
4.) A real miracle's a reminder and a warning that the line that separates the possible from the impossible isn't as firm as we like to think it is.: -Fierce People
5.) Wildcard: Choose your own.

1. I told myself I was relieved. But being relieved doesn't feel like a chunk of lead in your heart. --Marie Rutkowski

2. I felt stuck at the bottom of a wishing well. I was desperate to shout what I wanted, but I didn't know what that was. I only knew what it wasn't. --Amy Tan

3. If I read our story backwards, and then we were happy until one day, you forgot about me forever. --Joseph Gordon Levitt

4. That's the trouble with a brain- it thinks more than you want it to. --Tom Perotta

5. It's strange how close love and fear live to each other. Fredrik Backman

6. Prompt him.

quote, unquote.

the amazon — omina

marta caberera - knives out - ota

kazutora hanemiya | tokyo revengers

steve harrington • stranger things

Gabriel Ortiz - oc

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Tony Stark | MCU | Ota

Drifter | Destiny | OTA

Mat Cauthon | The Wheel of Time

aizawa shouta | my hero academia | ota

albedo | genshin impact | ota

zenin maki | jujutsu kaisen | ota

noctis lucis caelum | final fantasy xv | ota

rengoku kyojuro / kimetsu no yaiba / ota

alhaitham | genshin impact | ota

tokoyami fumikage | my hero academia | ota

Mithiel | Tolkien OC | OTA

Darlington • Alex Stern Series • Ota

Crius Oscius | OC | OTA