OFF HIS MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE

Bond had been relieved from duty playing any further role in helping with the security detail for the King's Coronation. Information leaked from a source within MI6 had aroused concern and suspicion about Bond's ellegiance to King Charles himself and so M had made the decision to exempt 007 from playing any further part in the historic occasion.  

"I'm sorry Bond but your apathy toward His Majesty is practically seeping through your pores."

"That's the scotch," the retired agent smirked.

"Well there's another reason then for me being concerned about your use to us right now. Your drinking has never been something we have properly talked about."

"What is this, M? An intervention? I'm too long in the tooth to be changing the habits of a lifetime."

Topping up his large tumbler of water, M deliberately took his time to drain his glass.

"If they were giving out honours for being passive aggressive you would surely be given the Grand Cross."

"What's the matter, Bond. Does my drinking water trigger you? You're not becoming a snowflake are you?"

"It's just the symbolism isn't exactly subtle."

"These aren't subtle times, Bond. You more than anyone should know that."

Getting up to leave the office, Bond stopped just before the red buttoned leather door.

"Buzz me out, M. I've got a holiday to enjoy."

Leaving Bond standing there for a brief moment like one of the many statues he'd acquired for his private art collection, M enjoyed the power of knowing 007 couldn't leave the room without activating the door release.

"Don't get drunk on your own power, M. Otherwise I might have to stage an intervention."

And with that barbed riposte he finally let Bond out.

Sitting in the Changi Lounge at Singapore airport, Bond was already on his third martini cocktail when he started to think about getting a taxi to his hotel apartment.

As he scrolled through Twitter, he caught a live stream of the Coronation playing on a news account. He felt nothing. It seemed wholly apt the anchronistic pagentry should be reduced to a six inch screen. Everything in the 21st century was gradually being reduced to be made more or less inconsequential. Moments of history now seemed to last about as long as the average attention span which was to say not very.

In some ways, he was grateful to the mole who leaked his private thoughts regarding the king. Why should he pretend he had feelings for the green tendrilled brained pagan when he didn't? He still mourned the passing of the late queen as she fitted the archetype of most strong matriachs in his life that had held a strange sort of power over him. She was someone he would have happily laid down his life for in protecting, but not Charles. He had no doubt he was amiable enough as a diplomat but just didn't see a natural leader in those vacant, shallow pond-like eyes.

Sad that it had come to this, Bond felt as if the coronation was more of a funeral for the Britain he had loved all his life than a celebration. A life spent in service protecting Queen and Crown, he suspected he was now destined to become a lounge lizard in airports all over the world as he searched for homes away from home.

An orphan of his country, his sense of who he was would probably shrink just like everything else of any worth or meaning. He was resigned to it. Of course, the martinis helped.

"Would you like another, Sir?"

"Go on then. Thank you."

And then in those brief moments between finishing his last martini and awaiting the next, Bond looked down at his phone and noticed something odd in the crowd at the top end of Parliament Street where the king's golden carriage was fast approaching.

A man with eyes hidden behind dark sunglasses was holding what appeared to be a smart phone camera directed arrow straight at the road in front of him while the crowd all around had turned their heads to watch the king's procession slowly arriving. Bond certain in his instincts quickly dialled M's private number with his mobile.

"Not now, Bond!"

"You have approximately two, maybe three minutes, to stop the King from being crowned with a bullet!"

"What are you talking about James. Are you drunk?"

Bond didn't answer M's unsubtle question.

"Portcullis House. There is a man on the corner with a beard holding a phone and wearing an acid green, tight microlight jacket ..."

But before Bond could finish, M had hung up on him.

Staring at his phone screen Bond could feel himself sobering up fast as he watched the royal carriage getting ever closer to where the man was standing, its trundling wheels seeming absurbdly antiquated.

And then, just as the carriage was about to align with the suspect's 'camera', he was dragged quickly away from the crowd by a couple of plain clothes security agents who efficiently disarmed him of his device.

Bond breathed a small sigh of relief.

"Fuck it, I guess I've saved the bastard anyway," he muttered under his breath.

"What was that, sir?" said the waitress returning with his fresh made cocktail.

"Oh nothing. God Save The King!"

"God Save The King!"

And with that, Bond turned off his phone and listened instead to the relaxing elevator jazz music that permeated the luxurious space whilst sipping his fourth cocktail.

Of course, the irony of drinking and saving the king off-duty hadn't escaped Bond's own unique, dry sense of humour and he toasted the air whilst visualising M's smug face.

"Here's a toast to bread my dear M, because without bread there would be no toast."

Bond was bread.

M was toast.