[edited 1-31-17]
Chapter Three: Spy Heroics
"Captain, this is John Steed," Bashir introduced, leading him onto the bridge. "Mr Steed, Captain Benjamin Sisko."
Steed tipped his hat. "A pleasure."
"Likewise."
"And this is Lieutenant Jadzia Dax," Bashir continued as she stepped forward from the science station.
Steed smiled and caught her hand, lifting it to his lips. "My dear!" he murmured.
Bashir's eyes narrowed at the sight of anyone else flirting with Dax, though she had never responded enough to give him any real claim on her. Blushing slightly, Dax pulled her hand free and stepped back beside Sisko.
"What's this about needing to discuss something with me, Julian?" the captain questioned.
Bashir glanced around. "Perhaps we could go somewhere more comfortable?" he suggested.
Sisko nodded. "Come to my ready room. Dax, come with us; Worf, you have the conn."
Steed had apparently taken Sisko's skin color and Dax's Trill spots in stride, but he started slightly as he followed Sisko's gaze and saw the Klingon. He made no comment, however, and followed the others to the turbolift.
In Sisko's ready room, Steed held a chair for Dax, and Bashir once again felt a strange surge of jealousy as with only a moment's hesitance, she allowed him to seat her.
"What's all the mystery about, Julian?" Sisko asked again.
Bashir sighed. "Captain…Mr Steed is from 1963."
Sisko narrowed his eyes. "And he's already seen far too much of our technology to go back."
"I say!" Steed murmured.
"That isn't the worst of it," Bashir continued. "He's a special agent with the British government, and there's a double impersonating him in 1963 England. And considering that this double put Mr Steed in a runabout and sent him here, I think it's a pretty good guess he's from our time, gone back to change some key event in history."
Sisko groaned, rubbing his forehead with his hand. "We don't have much choice, then; we have to get the right man back into that timeline. I don't suppose you could suppress his memory…?"
Bashir winced. "I'd rather not, sir," he said honestly. "I would prefer to think a government agent could be trusted to keep our advances secret."
"Of course," Steed put in.
"Besides…I was hoping you wouldn't send him down alone."
"Meaning?"
"Meaning this double has already overpowered Mr Steed once; I think it's our responsibility to be sure he doesn't succeed in whatever he's trying to do."
Dax rolled her eyes. "Honestly, Julian, are you sure you don't just want to play the hero in a real-life version of one of those spy adventures you're always running in the holosuites?"
"Easy, Old Man," Sisko cautioned, Steed's eyebrows lifting at the incongruous nickname. "Whatever Julian's motivation may be…he's right. If this…double…is attempting to change history, then it's our duty to do all in our power to stop him, and try to keep the timeline from being disrupted too badly in the process." He turned to their guest. "Mr Steed, we will gladly attempt to return you to your own time, and help get the double back to this one."
Steed gave a brief smile. "Thank you."
"Will we all go down, then?" Bashir questioned.
Dax shook her head. "I'd better not, at the very least; we run less risk of damaging the timeline ourselves if only Terrans beam down, and as few of those as possible."
Bashir glanced at her with regret in his eyes, always eager for any chance to spend more time with her, but understood her reasoning well enough to say nothing.
"Your presence will be missed," Steed told her, and Bashir suddenly changed his mind. Dax had accepted him as a competent doctor now, as had almost everyone on the station, but he wondered a little forlornly if she would ever see him as anything more than a lovesick boy when it came to his feelings toward her. The last thing he needed if he was ever going to win her was competition from a man who was obviously several years older and more experienced.
"Just me and Steed, then?" he questioned, giving no hint of the thoughts that had been running through his mind.
"I think I should come as well," Sisko put in.
"That's certainly your prerogative," Dax agreed, leaving unspoken the fact that she thought it unnecessary. She hadn't truly accepted the necessity of anyone going down at all, Bashir realized; she still thought he was just after a spy adventure, with boyish ambitions of being the hero who saved history from being irreparably damaged by the double.
Sisko nodded. "It's settled, then; after we slingshot back, the three of us humans will beam down and see what we can do about correcting this. In the meantime, Julian, why don't you show Mr Steed to guest quarters?"
Bashir nodded, getting to his feet. "This way," he gestured, and Steed followed him from the room.
"You didn't mention my double's unusual strength," he commented quietly when they were alone together in the hall.
"No," Bashir murmured uncomfortably, trying to dismiss his suspicions of the reason behind the double's apparently superhuman strength. "Nor did you."
"I was taking my cue from you," Steed protested.
Bashir shrugged. "They'll find out eventually anyway, I suppose. Here's the room," he added, changing the subject. He gave Steed a quick lesson in the use of the comm system and replicator and promised to see that his belongings were brought to him before leaving to go to his own quarters.
oOo
''Do you know what date you were injured?" Dax questioned, running the calculations that would enable them to slingshot back in time.
Steed looked at the ceiling, thinking hard for a moment. "Twenty-three April, I believe," he finally answered a little hesitantly.
Dax glanced at Bashir. "How reliable is his memory, Doctor?"
"He remembered the attack itself, so any memories of the time leading up to it should be accurate."
"We'll try for April 24, then," Dax decided. "Stardate 41701.7. We don't want to chance being there before you left," she explained to Steed; "it could set up some really weird paradoxes that would hopelessly snarl history."
"Whatever you say, my dear," Steed agreed.
Dax didn't reply, bending over her calculations for the next fifteen minutes, then double-checking them with Worf. Bashir watched the numbers flash across her screen at almost illegible speeds, idly watching for miscalculations that never appeared.
"We're good to go, sir," Dax announced.
Sisko nodded from the command chair. "Worf, take her back."
oOo
"Stardate 41701.7," Worf announced. "April 24, 1963, Earth time."
"Good piloting," Sisko told him. "Plot a course for geosynchronous orbit over England."
"Aye, Captain."
oOo
"No, no, no, these will never do," Steed protested, looking at the clothes Bashir had replicated. "The cut's all wrong; we'll stick out like a sore thumb."
"Sorry; the replicators aren't programmed for 1960s British fashion," Bashir apologized, mentally comparing the clothes to those in his spy holosuites. They didn't look that far off to him, but then those clothes had been designed by programmers in the twenty-fifth century; who was he to say how accurate they were?
"Why don't we beam Steed down alone first?" Dax suggested when Bashir and Steed explained the problem to her and Sisko. "One unfashionable person is less noticeable than three, and he can buy clothes for you and then be beamed back."
"A capital suggestion, my dear," Steed approved.
"You have enough money?" Sisko questioned.
"I have my checkbook," Steed assured him.
Sisko looked a little uncertain at the unfamiliar term, but guessed from Steed's tone that the answer was meant as a yes. "Let's go to the transporters, then."
Steed tugged ruefully at the replicated clothes as he stepped onto the transporter pad, wishing his own hadn't been damaged beyond repair. He adjusted his bowler as if to assure himself that that, at least, was his — Bashir having asking someone from engineering to knock the dent out — and hooked his umbrella over his arm. "Ready when you are," he said cheerfully.
"Oh," Bashir remembered suddenly just before Jadzia hit the switch. "Steed — see if you can get me a stethoscope and syringe."
He thought he saw Steed wink just before he disappeared in a column of light.
"We can pick those up after we beam down," Sisko told him.
"Maybe, but I'm not going down without my tricorder unless I at least have a stethoscope," Bashir said firmly. "And even then, if there's a pocket big enough to take it…"
"You can't use it," Sisko warned him.
"I can if you or Steed are injured and there are no observers," Bashir retorted.
Sisko shrugged in unspoken acquiescence. "Just don't let anyone else see you using it, then."
oOo
They had given Steed a spare combadge, and within an hour he called to be beamed up. He materialized already wearing his new suit — not, to Bashir's eye, all that different from the replicated one. He carried two more full sets of clothing draped over his arm, concealing something else which he presented to Bashir.
"A mostly-stocked medical kit, Doctor; I found it in a pawnshop."
Bashir grinned, opening the black leather bag and looking over the stethoscope and other old-fashioned instruments. "Thank you, Steed; this is perfect." He could replace the drugs with his own modern ones, and put a tricorder and hypospray in the bottom, without appearing as anything more than an average 1960s general practitioner.
Next chapter coming next week!
I proofread all my stories at least once before posting, but if you see any mistakes I might have missed, please let me know! (Note that the spelling of some Avengers characters' names has been changed intentionally.)
Please note that I have internet access only once a week, and may not have time to respond to all reviews/messages. If you have questions regarding my Deep Space Nine or Avengers alternate histories, check my profile first to see if they're answered there. Thanks for your understanding! Barbie