The Favour

by J. Ferguson a.k.a. Timeless A-Peel

Disclaimer: I don't own The New Avengers, nor any of the associated characters. They belong to The Avengers (Film and TV) Enterprises. I don't own The Avengers, either, or any of its characters. They belong to Canal+ (Image) International. This story is written for entertainment purposes only. No copyright infringement intended.

Timeline: Part of the arc continuity, somewhere in the early parts of 1977/season 2, between Merry Christmas, Mr. Gambit and Brazil. I suppose you could call it part 5.5 in the arc series, a little detour off the arc's usual beaten path. No prior knowledge of the rest of the series required for this one, though a knowledge of the early episodes of season 2 would give you a little context. If you're new to the whole arc series, please see my profile for an explanation (and more reading material, if you're interested).

Author's Note: Sneaking in an update now, as it'll probably be the only chance I have for awhile. The edit was a bit rushed for this one, but I don't think I spelled anyone's name wrong. ;-) Many thanks for all the lovely reviews-they mean a lot. Updates have been slow to come, though that's never been my intent, but I promise I'll wrap this one up before the end of the year. Only one more chapter to come after this, a tag scene of sorts. Then, hopefully, I'll manage to post some Christmassy fluff before the day itself. Until then, a fairly long chapter to distract you from all that shopping you're meant to be doing.

Gambit took the train to the town his MI6 contact had provided, keeping half an eye open just in case he was being followed. After Purdey's visit, however, he didn't think it was likely. He smiled to himself. Emma had been right, about many things. Thankfully. Now it was time to pay her back for her shrewd observations.

He installed himself in an unglamourous but serviceable room over a pub for the night, and despite taking all the regular precautions, he slept peacefully and without interruption, awoke early enough that he didn't have to rush through breakfast, and by eleven was striding down the lane that would take him to the comfortable old house sitting just outside the heart of the town, which MI6 had pressed into service.

Gambit had chosen to dress in his pinstriped suit for this particular visit, in his experience always the best choice when he wanted to insinuate himself into the offices of bureaucrats, or anyone else with a predilection for officiousness. Something about a pinstripe seemed to calm that lot enough that they'd temper their annoyance at being pressed into doing things outside the 'usual' channels. Gambit was hoping it would work just as well on suspicious MI6 agents who'd spent the past month holed up with a bunch of engineering types. Hopefully they wouldn't feel the need to shoot him just for the entertainment value.

In his right hand, Gambit carried the suitcase containing Emma's papers, a suitably nondescript affair that befitted a courier, which really was what he was. The fact that his mission was a bit unorthodox didn't change that.

Reaching the gate to the house, which was helpfully unequipped with a lock, Gambit squared his shoulders, and arranged his face into the suitably bland, nondescript expression that Cynthia's minions at Button-Lip had down to a tee. Then he set on up the main walkway. He reached the door and gave the knocker three short raps. It didn't take long for someone to answer.

"Yes?" the man asked, eyeing him suspiciously through the smallest gap he could without actively looking as though he didn't want anyone looking in. "Can I help you?"

Gambit slid the MI6 ID out of his outer breast pocket, and held it under the doorman's nose. "Michael O'Carroll. I'm the courier with a delivery for Peter Peel." He tucked the ID away again as soon as the man had glanced at it. "I was told that someone telephoned ahead."

The doorman looked him up and down, didn't seem to find anything that would justify shooting him, and nodded, with barely-noticeable disappointment. "They did. You'd better come in."

Gambit flashed one of his millisecond-long smiles and accepted the invitation. It was easier than he'd expected. All the same, he wasn't surprised when the doorman was quickly joined by burly friend.

"We'll need to do a search," the doorman told him. "Procedure. You understand?"

"Of course." Gambit handed the briefcase off to the burly one, and held his hands up obediently as he was patted down, mentally congratulating himself for resisting the urge to bring any of his usual arsenal along for the ride. He felt slightly vulnerable, but he was clean. The burly man rifled through the papers in the briefcase and came up empty. He shook his head at the doorman, and closed the case to hand back to Gambit.

"Thank you for your cooperation," the doorman said, all hopes of excitement completely dashed by this point. "I'll take you to Mr. Peel."

Gambit followed him, resisting the urge to toss the burly guard a cheeky salute. Such flippancy didn't befit a courier, and could get him in trouble. Better luck next time... he mentally told his escort.

The doorman led him down a hall and round a corner, eventually bringing him to an oak-panelled door at the end of the corridor. "Mr. Peel's just in there," he told Gambit. "I'll remind you that his time is valuable, so keep it short."

"Yes, sir," Gambit agreed, trying to shake off the incongruity of hearing Emma's surname with 'Mr.' installed in front of it. It shouldn't have seemed wrong—it had been Peter Peel's name first, after all, and Emma had quit using it herself after her divorce. But 'Mrs. Peel' sounded much more natural to his Ministry-trained ears all the same. "It shouldn't take long," he assured the doorman, hoping he hadn't betrayed any of his internal confusion.

The doorman nodded curtly, just once, and added, "I'll be waiting just down the hall when you're finished." He strode off, rounding the corner and disappearing from sight once more. Gambit turned and knocked on the door.

"Come," said a voice inside, and Gambit turned the knob, stepped inside, and nearly fainted.

Like most Ministry trainees, Gambit had heard the stories about Emma Peel's sudden and unexpected departure from the department. Among the many, many pieces of gossip floating around the events surrounding that particular day was the assertion that Peter Peel, when viewed from the back, was the spitting image of John Steed. Like most of the stories coming out of the Ministry's rumour mill, Gambit had taken it with a grain of salt, but the second he saw the man seated behind a desk with his back to Gambit, he mentally apologised to every rumourmonger in the typing pool. Because for the second or two after Gambit walked into the room, he would have sworn blind that the man behind the desk was Steed. Same broad shoulders, same shaped head, same dark black waves gelled carefully in place. The resemblance was eerie. Gambit chanced a glance round the office he'd stepped into and half-expected to see the stud farm.

But the second the man turned around in his chair, the illusion was shattered, and Gambit was confronted by the face that he recognised in Peter Peel's Ministry file. The face was nothing like Steed's. Where Steed's eyes were grey, Peter's were a dark brown. The lips weren't anywhere near as thin, the nose straight but holding the telltale signs of at least one breakage. The jaw was a little sharper, the hairline not as square. And then, of course, there was the age. Peter Peel was over a decade younger than Steed, and while the latter was carrying his years well, it was clear that, while Steed was now firmly in his mid-fifties, Peter Peel was still in the early days of his forties. He fixed Gambit with a mildly quizzical expression.

"Can I help you?" he inquired, and the voice wasn't like Steed's either, huskier in pitch.

"I hope so," Gambit said truthfully, crossing the room and once more producing his ID. "Michael O'Carroll. I'm a courier for MI6. I have some papers for you to sign."

"Papers?" Peter was nonplussed. Clearly no one had passed on Emma's numerous messages and attempts to contact him. MI6 was serious about sealing its people off from the rest of the world. "What sort of papers?"

"I really couldn't say, sir," Gambit lamented. It was only half a lie—he hadn't gone through Emma's paperwork in any detail. There wasn't any need, not for what he was going to be doing. And a courier would be left in the dark as to the nature of his payload as much as possible, for security's sake. Gambit set the briefcase down on the desk, opened it, and produced a thin folder. "But I'm told that there's a letter explaining everything inside." He held the folder out to Peter, who took it, but not before regarding him slight suspicion.

"Is there?" he murmured, opening the folder and perusing the contents. "We'll see what it's about then, shall we?"

Gambit's smile was noncommittal. He closed the case, settled down in the chair on the opposite side of the desk, and resigned himself to a long wait as Peter read and digested the contents of the folder. From his new, closer vantage point, Gambit could pick out the scars on Peter Peel's forehead and down one cheek. They were faint, and wouldn't be noticed by the casual observer, but Gambit had more than his own share of mementos of past battles, and was an old pro at picking them out in others. Steed, amazingly, had manages to make it through his career without any lingering marks on his face, but Peter hadn't been so lucky. Then again, Peter had survived a devastating place crash, one that left his physically incapacitated for months, and mentally even longer, to the point that he'd been missing presumed dead for three years before he managed to send a message home from the deepest, darkest depths of the Brazilian jungle. Given that history, he was lucky to have emerged as unscathed as he had.

"These are from my wife," Peter said, and Gambit snapped back to reality from musing on what it would be like to forget who you were for such a long time, only to wake up one morning to the realisation that you'd lost three years.

"Are they, sir?" he commented, maintaining a professional detachment. A courier wouldn't care about the contents, just that they got where they were meant to go safely.

"Yes. Well, my ex-wife," Peter amended. He shuffled through them, seemingly unperturbed by the contents. "She wants me to give her some sort of approval to make a business deal. All business, though I suppose I shouldn't expect any more from her at this stage. Divorce doesn't often leave much room for friendly correspondence."

"I wouldn't have thought so, sir," Gambit parroted back, wishing that this would be over with already. He was tiring of playing the part of obedient and officious Michael O'Carroll, and peppering his comments with 'sir.' It reminded him too much of his time in the army, and his own version of Peter Peel's ordeal. "Will you be signing them, sir, or should I report back that you refused?"

Peter reached for a pen on the desk with a sigh. "No, I'll sign. Don't have much to gain by holding out, and even if I did, I'd like to think I wasn't the sort of man who went out of the way to make life miserable for his ex-wife."

"Very decent of you, sir," Gambit praised, genuinely for once. He didn't know what he'd do if Peter had proved difficult to convince. Emma had insisted he wouldn't be, but there was no way of knowing. Still, it seemed Emma knew her former husband very well, despite Peter's rather large absence in the middle of their marriage, and the less-than-perfect years that followed his return.

Peter's head was bent as he skimmed the papers and signed where required, but he seemed to feel the need to talk to Gambit even as he did so. "It wasn't one of those knock-down, drag-them-out divorces," he confided conversationally. "Before I'd gone through it myself, I thought there wasn't anything but. But then my ex-wife isn't any ordinary woman." He glanced up at Gambit. "You may have heard of her. She used to work with you lot, when I was AWOL. Emma Knight. Well, she was Emma Peel then, obviously. All very secret, but she did tell me the name of her department. 'The Ministry,' or something else obtuse." He chuckled at the name, as though the simplified absurdity of it amused him. A thought suddenly occurred to him, and he levelled his gaze at Gambit. "She must have contacted your department if she wanted to send these papers along..." he said slowly. "But she wouldn't have known where to send them unless someone told her I was here, and she'd need someone on the inside for that." His gaze penetrated Gambit's and looked straight into his soul. "And I was told I wouldn't receive any outside communications, which makes your visit rather unusual." He leaned back in his chair and regarded Gambit knowingly. "It wasn't you she contacted, by any chance, was it?"

Gambit performed the most nonchalant shrug in the history of shrugs. "I'm just a courier, sir. She would have gone through my superiors."

"And who would that be?" Peter wanted to know. "Wouldn't be a chap called Steed, would it? Ministry man?"

"I'm MI6, sir," Gambit said levelly. "Nothing to do with the Ministry, or whatever it is you called it." He paused, then added, quite truthfully, "And no one named Steed ordered me to deliver those papers."

Peter regarded him for a moment, then nodded. "All right. Maybe you don't know Steed. But I'd bet everything I own that you know Emma."

"I may have read about her in the paper, sir," Gambit replied, praying Peter would drop the questioning and just sign the damn papers. "She runs some industrial company, doesn't she?"

"Yes. Knight Industries." Peter was looking him up and down with renewed interest. "Well, she's certainly moved on, hasn't she? I could see her reuniting with Steed, but I never saw her taking up with a younger model."

Gambit, mercifully, controlled the urge to blush. "I don't know what you're insinuating, sir, but I can assure you that I don't know your wife."

Peter, to his credit, didn't seem upset by the prospect. The smile he gave Gambit was almost sadly resigned. "All right, O'Carroll. I apologise if I've offended you."

Gambit's jaw worked slightly. "I think you'd better finish signing those papers, sir."

"Yes, of course." Peter turned back to his task. For a moment, all was silent. Then, without looking up, Peter spoke quietly. "But if you do know her, really know her, and heaven knows I don't blame you if you do, you should know that, no matter what you do for her, no matter how much you love her, it'll never be enough." He glanced up, and the smile was truly sad this time, untempered by any other emotion. "She loves someone else, you see. I don't know if she'll ever act on it, or if she already has, but it doesn't matter. If you're not him, I'm afraid you're out of luck." He ducked his head, before the waters could get too deep. "It's hard to love someone who loves someone else, O'Carroll. Don't let yourself fall into that trap if you can help it, not unless there's some inkling you may have a chance."

Gambit thought of a completely different, but very similar, situation that he'd been certain was waiting for him back in London. But he had his reasons to think it wasn't as dire as Peter's. "I won't, sir."

"Good man." Peter gave the papers one last look-through, then closed the folder and handed them back. "There you are, O'Carroll. Give them to Emma with my blessing."

"I'll be certain to pass that on, sir," Gambit assured, returning the folder to his case and reaching out to shake the man's hand. He'd come to feel rather sorry for him. "Thank you for being so prompt in carrying out your business."

Peter's smile was genuine. "And thank you for looking after Emma's affairs. It's nice to know she has resources to draw upon, even if I'm not there. Everyone needs someone, you know."

Gambit smiled back, genuinely as well. "Very true, sir. Very true."

Emma Knight was curled up on her couch, a drink in one hand, and a book in the other. She was clad in dark blue lounging pajamas, auburn hair falling casually around her shoulders. The mood in her flat was calm, serene, and yet there was something about the way her eyes flicked from her text to the small clock on her side table that betrayed a faint undercurrent of anticipation. A tiny line appeared between her eyebrows as she noted the time, before she returned to her book with renewed concentration. It was only then, of course, that her doorbell rang.

Emma smiled knowingly, unfurling her long legs and depositing her drink on the table, before rising and crossing the living area to answer the door. She was not surprised to find Mike Gambit waiting for her on the other side, sporting a rather pleased little smile all his own.

Emma arched an eyebrow. "Gentlemen callers at this hour? You're not helping my reputation."

"You can't blame me for everything," Gambit quipped back. "Anyway, your doorman remembers me, so at least he thinks you're consistent." Gambit had been to Emma's flat a handful of times, when restaurants or the offices of Knight Industries hadn't proved suitable. It was considered the better alternative to Gambit's flat, where there was always a chance that Purdey or Steed could drop by, necessitating rather uncomfortable explanations. This was much easier. Gambit tilted his head to read the cover of the book in Emma's hand, which she'd brought with her. "John Locke. Your bedtime reading's more ambitious than mine."

"Seventeenth century political-philosophy goes down much easier the third of fourth time around," Emma told him. She nodded at the briefcase in his hand. "Did you manage it?"

Gambit's grin was answer enough. "Signed, sealed, delivered," he confirmed, holding up the case as evidence.

"Ahh..." Emma almost hummed, taking it from him. "Thank you. Come in." She stepped back to allow him entry, nudging the door closed behind them before taking her precious cargo to her desk. "This will clear up any number of headaches," she went on as she opened the case and extracted the papers. "Knight Industries owes you a great debt."

"I'd settle for a drink."

Emma inclined her head towards the clutch of decanters on the sideboard. "Help yourself."

"Thanks." Gambit did just that, mentally thanking Emma for stocking such good Scotch.

"Were there any problems?" Emma wanted to know, perusing the papers.

"Nothing major," Gambit replied, sauntering over to where she stood, and peering disinterestedly at the papers over her shoulder. "Peter didn't take much persuading. He was quite reasonable. I was surprised-I actually liked him."

Emma looked up at that. "Why would you think otherwise? I did marry him. I like to think my judgment was sound when I did it, even if I was much younger than I am now."

Gambit held his hand up in mock-defence. "I believe you. It's the society pages that don't. Everything I've ever read made him out to be the villain of the piece, and the Ministry files don't help him much. They lost one of their best operatives when he turned up and spirited you away from a life you loved. It's hard not to see him as an interloper." He smiled a sad little smile. "He still loves you, you know."

Emma sighed and set the papers down on her desktop. "Of course I do."

"Did you love him?"

Emma didn't meet his eyes, instead stared straight ahead. "Very much. If it hadn't been for that plane crash, I have no doubt I still would. But things change. People change." She finally turned her head, met Gambit's eyes. "There was no reason to carry on. It would have been cruel to stay with him when there was no hope. So I let him go. Anyone who cares about anyone would do the same."

Gambit nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I think I believe that now."

Emma cocked her head quizzically. "What do you mean?"

Gambit looked down into his glass. "I had a visit from Purdey, right before I left."

Emma's smile was self-congratulatory. "And what did she say?"

"A lot of things."

"Give me the condensed version."

Gambit's mouth quirked up on one side. "Let's just say I feel wanted again."

"I don't believe you ever weren't wanted," Emma declared, "but I'm happy for you all the same."

"Thanks, but sometimes knowing isn't enough. Sometimes you need proof." Gambit worked his jaw slightly. "Peter asked if you sent me, if I was in league with Steed." He held her gaze. "Does he know...?"

Emma turned her back on him to walk to where the drinks were. "There isn't anything to know. I may have left him, but it doesn't follow that I did it to go to someone else."

"And you didn't," Gambit agreed. "At least, not for a couple of years, until you crashed that party just to hang about in the shadows, which was my territory."

Emma whirled around. "Is there something you want to say?"

Gambit half-shrugged. "Just this. I've been using you, Emma. Just a bit. To see if I get a rise out of Purdey and Steed. I admit that now, even though I don't think I would have when you asked me for this favour. But Emma, I'd just like to know, are you using me a little bit, too, because I'm the closest link you have to Steed?"

Emma pursed her lips. "Mike..."

Gambit ploughed on regardless. "I mean, I know why I sought you out. But you probably would have given me the brush-off if one of my opening lines hadn't been, 'I work with Steed.'"

Emma managed one of her lopsided smiles. "Now you're selling yourself short."

"Thanks." Gambit raised his glass to her. "But I'm a realist. I'm a link to your old life—to Steed. And maybe, just maybe, like me, you were hoping you'd get caught, that Steed would find out you knew me. Break the impasse." He regarded her intently. "I'll understand if that was your reasoning. I'd just like to know what this—" He waved his hand back and forth between them "—is. For future reference."

Emma sighed, leaned back against the sideboard and crossed her arms. "I suppose since I've accused you of something similar, it would be childish for me to deny the same."

"Not really, if it was the truth," Gambit said matter-of-factly, joining her against the sideboard. "But I've been wondering about this for awhile now, and I get the feeling you're not going to deny it."

Emma tipped her head back. "At first, maybe," she confessed. "Not only because of Steed, but because it was nice to have someone to talk to, about those days. I've signed so many confidentiality agreements, and there was only so much I could confide to anyone—friends, family, business associates. Peter. That work, that life, it changes you, and it's very frustrating to not be able to explain why. You were the first person I met in all the years after I left that I could talk to without censoring myself. And it was such a relief. Furthermore, I do miss the work. More than I should. Whenever you spoke of an assignment, I felt as though I was living vicariously through you. I could feel that same rush in my veins." She looked down, looking mildly ashamed. "So I suppose I used you several ways."

Gambit tilted his head to one side philosophically. "Nice way to be used."

Emma shot him a glance. "It's not like that any longer, Mike. You should know that. You're a very good friend, connections aside."

Gambit smiled appreciatively, but there was a telltale crease between his eyes, the one Purdey referred to as his '11'. "Why don't you just call Steed? Ask him to dinner, for drinks, anything. He'd jump at the chance. Why do you keep waiting for him to make the first move?"

Emma shook her head. "I'm not sitting here, pining away, waiting to be rescued, if that's what you're implying," she shot back, with just a touch of steel to her voice. "You must understand—when I left, after Peter was found, I was thoughtless. I should have contacted Steed as soon as I'd wrapped my own mind around it, and told him what had happened. As it was, he found out with the rest of England, in the morning papers." She wrinkled her mouth in annoyance. "I went to his flat later that morning, and he knew, of course. I said good-bye right then and there, and left immediately with Peter. I ended it, and I did it on my own terms, without any sort of courtesy extended to him." She pushed her hair back from her forehead, self-recriminating annoyance written all over her features. "I chose to leave that way, my way, because I was too cowardly to do anything more than cut-and-run. I can't do that, and then simply walk back into his life whenever it takes my fancy. It wouldn't be fair to Steed, just as it wasn't then." She met Gambit's eyes. "That's why I don't call him. When—if-he chooses to contact me, it'll be on his terms, because he's willing to take the chance. Until then..." She trailed off. There was nothing more to be said.

Gambit finished his drink, set the empty glass down on the sideboard. "I understand, though I think he'd be all right with it even if you imposed. But it's not my business." He took her left hand, gave it a squeeze. "But it is my business to get back there before my curfew kicks in. I have to go back to working for the other side."

Emma smirked. "I thought you made a very good double agent."

"Maybe, but I don't think my nerves could take it, and I don't think Steed and Purdey would be too pleased about it, either." He gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. "I'll see you later, okay?"

Emma nodded at the darkening scene outside her window. "You'd better get going. They'll be expecting you at six."