Who's Who?

Patrick Macnee sat in his dressing room, having a spot of tea. He pulled a bottle of scotch from a drawer and added a dollop to the cup, then sipped and savored. ''Ah.'' He sat there with his eyes closed. It was only ten a.m., but it had already been a long day - he'd arrived at six in the morning. They'd been filming since seven. Today had supposed to be outdoor scenes, but a violent thunderstorm was raging so they were filming all of the transmigration scenes instead. A smile played around Macnee's lips. Transmigration indeed. The plots their writers came up with. Of course this was going to be an extremely fun episode to film - he and Diana Rigg were already laughing about it. Steed and Emma actually kissing on screen! Should give their fans quite a thrill. A knock on his door. ''Five minutes, Mr. Macnee.'' Patrick finished off his tea, picked up a sticky bun and munched on it as he made his way back to the set. Arnold Diamond, who played Dr. Krelmar was off to one side, practicing his German accent, Patrick surmised, Freddie Jones who played Basil was practicing slouching his shoulders in front of a mirror, and Patricia Haines who played Lola had pulled her wig off and was looking at it disconsolately. ''Have you ever seen such a mole's nest?'' she asked Patrick as he came up to her. ''Well, you are a Russian, my dear,'' Patrick told her unsympathetically. She popped her bubble gum at him. Patrick walked over to 'the machine.' He shook his head. The designer had certainly spared no expense with this thing. There were light bulbs everywhere, which would go off when ''Dr. Krelmar'' flicked his various switches. ''Alright, Patrick.'' Patrick stood to one side as the director blocked out the scene, where Freddie and Pat dragged his body over to the machine and placed it in the chair. Not hisbody of course. Patrick didn't believe in doing his own fighting and he didn't believe in having his body dragged around, either. Once his stunt man had finished all that dragging, however, Patrick took his place in the chair, eyes closed. He waited patiently while someone lowered the visor over his head, or the vi-zor as Arnold said with relish, and continued to sit patiently, eyes closed, while the others gave their lines. ''When I give the signal, you will start counting,'' Diamond/Krelmar said. He started flicking switches. There were no sounds, of course - thank goodness the designers hadn't tried to put that into the machine - but Patrick could ''see'' the lights flashing through his closed eyelids. ''Now','' he heard Arnold say. Freddie started to count. Patrick waited patiently while Freddie got up to ten. Then, suddenly, he felt the ground literally shake and a great ball of lightning in his head. He felt as if he had been hit by a thunderbolt. Consciousness returned with a jerk. Patrick lifted his head and looked around blurrily. His head hurt, his shoulders ached, there was something wrong with his arms, and there was something wrong with the scene in front of him. Diana was walking along the row of stilts, and on the other side of the row of stilts he could see Patricia, poised to strike. But there was no director, no light men, no lights, no cameraman - and there was no bloody camera! Patrick was nothing if not a trooper. He knew the line and he said it. ''Mrs. Peel! Look out!'' Diana ducked, and a stilt went sliding over her head and crashing through a window. Patrick looked on incredulously as a man came into view. Not just any man....a man who looked just ...like... him. Not only a man who looked just like him but who was dressed exactly like him. Diana looked up at the man, her face a study, and exclaimed ''Steed!'' Then her eyes widened in shock as the man raised his arm and brought the umbrella down viciously. There should have been a director there to yell cut, and then Action again for Diana to just fall over - but that wasn't the way it worked. Patrick watched in utter horror as the umbrella handle actually caught her across the head - he actually heard the thwack, and she crumpled bonelessly to the floor. Patricia came up to him and slapped him. She actually slapped him! ''Very foolish, Mr. Steed.'' Patrick stared up at her. It was Patricia alright - Patricia with the awful blonde wig, on top of the beautiful face - but her eyes were very cold. ''I felt that. That was my face you were bruising.'' Those were his lines, but they were being said by the man who looked exactly like him, and then that man was in front of him, looking very big and ugly. My god, he had no idea he could look so menacing. Patricia looked nervous, but he just snapped his fingers at her. ''Go and help the doctor.'' Then the man turned and looked down at him. Patrick stared up at him. He was looking into a mirror and the doppelganger had walked out of it. ''I admire your tailor, old man. Very good taste.'' Patrick gaped at him. They were the right lines...and the man in front of him certainly looked like him....and he hadn't studied Freddie Jones' lines and what the hell was he supposed to say? The trooper came to the fore once more. ''More than I can say for yours.'' Then he leaned back quickly, and the man who looked like him did indeed whip that umbrella round very close to his face. '' Uh, uh. Your face, remember.'' The man spun away. Patrick's mouth felt as dry as the inside of a parrot's cage. The backs of his eyeballs hurt. But he wasn't drunk. He wasn't drunk. He'd had one tot of whiskey in his tea. One. This could not be happening. Patrick turned to look behind him...and caught his eyes in the mirror there. His eyes, looking out of Freddie Jones' face. Was he having some kind of bizarre homosexual fantasy? No, not possible. In twenty years of walking on stage in the presence of the handsomest of men and the most beautiful of women, it was only the women who had ever caused any stirrings in him. And if he were having a homosexual fantasy it would not be his fantasy to exist in the body of Freddie Jones, and that was bloody certain. Vaguely he became aware of voices and noises from the next room. The room with the Machine in it. He squeezed his eyes closed and tried to picture it in his mind - how they'd been supposed to film it. The three of them...Arnold, Freddie and Patricia....Krelmar, Steed and Lola, had Diana....Emma Peel - in the chair, and Patricia had taken her chair and they had lowered those damn vi-zors and Arnold was flicking the switches and the lights would be flashing ridiculously. Diana would open her eyes. But was it Diana? The man who was supposed to be Arnold Diamond but who must really have been Dr. Krelmar would turn off the machine...click, click click, would go those damn switches....while he ....Basil/Steed ....slipped back the bonds and freed the woman's arms. And it should be him, him who would lean forward and say, ''You okay?'' and be there while Diana went '''Mmmm,'' and leaned forward and kissed him! and then say, incredibly, ''Great, baby.'' Basil/Steed would said fatuously, ''That's my Lola.'' She would pushed him away and walked over to where Emma/Lola was now sitting and say ''What do we do with...me?'' "What's good for the goose is good for the ...help me, Doctor." And, indeed, within a very few minutes the two men appeared, carrying Patricia Haines' body over to the post to which they had chained Patrick. He felt them unchaining one of his hands but he was absolutely in no position to do anything about it even if Lola/Emma had not been standing there with a gun in her hand as they did it. And in any even he couldn't take his eyes off Diana. Lola/Emma. She was so beautiful. She looked exactly like Diana! Was he really looking at the real Emma Peel? The real Emma Peel who was now inhabited by a vicious enemy agent. She didn't take her eyes off him, but the expression in those eyes, the smug smile...that was not, could not be Diana looking at him. ''I think I'm going to be sick,'' Patrick murmured, but they ignored him. We make a very handsome couple,'' Lola said, gazing at them. ''Come on, lover, we've got a full program ahead.'' Steed/Basil brushed past her briskly and bent down to stare at Patrick. '' If you shout, don't count on anyone hearing you.'' ''Uh, uh,'' Emma/Lola said. She turned back and plucked the package of gum from Lola/Emma's pocket, and flourished it at Steed/Basil. ''Old habits die hard." Patrick felt the chains move....Emma must have regained consciousness. ''Steed! That woman! That's not me!'' Patrick swore inwardly, but he had to do it. He turned his head and said at his most insouciant, ''Save your breath, Mrs. Peel. That's not me, either.'' Go to Who's Who 2

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