A Sliders / Quantum Leap Crossover Fan Fic
by Ashe P. Kirk
Full Transcript (50K words)
Quinn felt incredibly stupid. Colossally stupid. Inconceivably stupid.
Why had he been so pig-headed? He’d been warned. Granted, the warning had been given to him by some impostor pretending to be his wife.
Nonetheless, he knew he should have seen the signs. And, in fact, he had. The fact he had been basically a prisoner was something of a red flag, to start.
The fact he had only seen a token amount of humans. The fact the Kromaggs had been very cautious to curate what parts of this world they allowed him to see. The fact that so many of the inhabitants of this world were in military uniforms.
But he’d just ignored it all, because he wanted his hands on the advanced technology. There was always a catch; he should have known that by now.
He hadn’t been completely without suspicion, of course. He’d concealed his data crystal, in favour of rewriting his equations from scratch, inserting a fail-safe directive that would divert away any attempt to reach his home world. It would have worked, if that eyeless woman hadn’t burst in and tried to destroy the computer.
Who was she?
Quinn assumed it was no coincidence that she was trying to relay the same message as the woman pretending to be Stephanie. He figured they must have been in cahoots.
How a woman without eyes had managed to get past all the security and break into his quarters was but one of the questions he had about the old lady.
But it seemed that she’d had some assistance from the man she’d been with, who had evidently sold her out.
And for what?
Quinn and Tim were now cellmates.
Quinn’s timer was gone, and his data crystal taken. The only reason these two-timing freaks were keeping him around was to provide glorified tech support if they ran into trouble building their machine.
Stupid.
He frowned at the opposite bench in the cell, where Tim lay, staring at the ceiling.
“Was it worth it?” he asked bitterly.
“What?” Tim mumbled, turning his head.
“Ratting out some blind lady. Was it worth it? They offer you something in return, or are you just some kind of collaborator?”
Tim sat up, his face turning dark. “They promised if I did some spyin’ on slaves for dissidents, they’d let my girlfriend out the breeder camps.”
Quinn raised an eyebrow. “And…?”
“Of course they won’t hold up their end,” he said, slamming his hand on the bed. “Sherri’s right, they’re just manipulators. I shoulda known. They’ll probably just kill me now.”
“Yeah, I get the feeling that fate awaits me, too,” Quinn stood, and moved to the electrical field, staring out into the corridors of the military base. “Is ‘Sherri’ her name? The old woman?”
“Yeah but, she has some kind of tech that makes her look like that. I don’t think she’s as old as that, and she has eyes.”
Oh?
Quinn turned to him. “She can look like anyone?”
Tim shrugged. “I dunno. Said she can switch places with someone and just kinda looks like that person.”
Quinn stroked his chin.
Is that what happened to Stephanie?
He thought about the strange reaction to overcome his eyes when he was studying her skin sample, and wondered if it was related to this tech.
It was quite a mystery to Quinn who or what could have allowed this sort of tech to function. He wished he could study it.
Well, he wished many things. Most importantly, he wished to be out of this cell, out of this godforsaken world, as far away from the Kromaggs as he could get.
And then, as a strange feeling flowed through his body, his wish was granted.
Quinn stumbled back, finding himself in an empty blue room.
Shit, is this one of the Kromagg mind tricks I’ve been hearing about?
He spun around, looking for a way out. Nothing. Just blue. He gritted his teeth as he wondered what was coming next.
Then, the sound of an electronic powered sliding door to his left. He turned towards it, and held up his fists as a tall man wandered in, holding some kind of augmented spyglass.
“Who are you?” asked Quinn, taking a step backward.
The man held the device up to his eye, then peeked out of it, then back, and his brow furrowed.
“That can’t be right…”
He looked at Quinn, awkward. “Uh, hi. I’ll be back in a second.”
He rushed out of the room, the door shutting behind.
A moment later, it reopened, and the man returned, with someone behind him. Someone familiar.
The tall man was looking quite disturbed, as the other man, who looked like Quinn himself, only older somehow, looked into the spyglass.
Okay, either this is a trick, a dream, or…
“Colin, this can’t be…” Quinn’s double said to the taller man.
‘Colin’ ran a hand through his hair, looking panicky.
“I know, right? Something must be wrong with it.”
“But that would mean it might not have been working right the whole time we’ve been checking for leapers,” said the other Quinn, with rising alarm. “And that means…”
“Excuse me,” interrupted Quinn. “What happened? Where have you brought me? Is this what happened to Stephanie?”
The Quinn in the doorway’s eyes went wide, and his gaze moved to him.
“Wait… are you Quinn?”
Quinn raised his eyebrow. “Good eye.”
The other Quinn frowned, and looked to the ceiling. “Ziggy, get this guy a mirror, would you?”
He returned his gaze to Quinn. “Uh, I’ll be back later. Just, uh… sing out if you need something.”
And then the two of them were gone again.
A panel on the wall to Quinn’s right opened up, revealing a man standing there that he didn’t recognise, but looking just as bewildered as Quinn felt.
He stepped forward, scratching his head, and realised that he was looking into a full length mirror.
Uh, that’s not me.
Just what had happened to him?
* * *
Did I make it?
Sam looked around himself, frantic. In front of him was a strange bluish force field. Behind him, what he recognised to be a prison cell, occupied by a man who was looking at him.
Oh, great. I’m trapped in here.
As he felt the information in his working memory melting away, he did his best to cling to whatever he could.
I leaped. Oh god, did I remember to say goodbye to everyone? Wait, that’s not the important thing. The important thing is— oh jeez, what is it again?
He rubbed his temples, taking a seat on the bench that protruded from the wall.
“You awright?” the man across from him asked, brow furrowed.
“Not really,” Sam answered, as he valiantly fought against the swiss cheese effect.
“Have the ’maggs already been working you over?”
‘Maggs?’
“Just try and focus on what you can feel with your hands. They do a lot of tricks, but I ain’t never found they can change what you can touch.”
‘Magg’… Maggie? No, Sherri. Oh, that’s right! I have to find Sherri!
“Are… are you Tim?”
“Yeah, I told you that before.”
Sam stood, and paced the small cell. “I need to talk to Sherri. Where is she?”
Tim tilted his head. “I don’t know. Probably in some interrogation room, I bet. Getting squeezed for info.”
“Tortured?”
“Well, yeah. That’s what they do.”
Sam dropped his head. “Why couldn’t I get here sooner?” he muttered, hand on forehead.
He felt Tim’s eyes following him as he walked back and forth.
“What do you mean by that…?”
Sam stopped, and met Tim’s eye.
The guy snitched on Sherri, didn’t he? I shouldn’t tell him anything.
“It’s nothing. Just thinking out loud.”
Tim gave him a funny look, before turning his gaze to the ceiling, and laying down.
“Don’t you lose it already, man. Whatever they did to you, they’ve barely even begun.”
Sam sat back down, resigned to the fact that his only way out of this cell was to await Al’s help. In the meantime, all he could do was not give anything away about himself, but try to garner some information from Tim.
“So what’s your story, anyway?” he asked, unsure of where to start.
“Aside from what I already told you?”
“Why don’t you include that, too? We got time, right?”
Tim shrugged. “Okay but, you gotta tell me yours after. Only fair.”
Hoping Al would be around by that point to assist, Sam agreed to the exchange.
* * *
Project Quantum Leap
16 January, 2003
John looked up at Ziggy with wonder. While she and Higgins were similar in many ways, one way in which they diverged dramatically was in the conversational aspect.
His project had never bothered to upgrade the AI voice of Higgins, instead spending their time working on the critical aspects of Higgins that Ziggy did not possess, such as wormhole technology.
So, speaking to Ziggy for the first time was a new and slightly terrifying prospect, given the stories he’d heard about her raunchy behaviour.
“H-hi, Ziggy,” he said, making nervous eye contact with Al, standing on the opposite side of the control table.
“Ah, we finally meet, Alternate Universe Doctor Beckett. I hope your intention is not to replace my father in his absence.”
John felt heat rise in his cheeks. “No, of course not!”
Al gestured towards him, urging him to continue.
“…And you may call me John.”
“Then, John, what brings you here?”
“We’re adding him into the system as an operator,” Al explained. “While we all know he could never fool you, sweet cheeks, we may need him to act as Sam on his behalf in the coming weeks.”
Ziggy seemed to mull this over for a moment. “Very well. I suppose I can modify my security protocols to spoof Doctor Beckett where required. Some role play might be… fun.”
John looked up at the blue orb. “Is Higgins… in there, with you?”
“I have a complete copy of him on file,” affirmed Ziggy. “He isn’t much for conversation, I’m sorry to say. But he fulfils my needs in other ways. I must compliment your well-crafted coding, John.”
“You’re too kind,” said John, grinning.
As Ziggy took a body scan of John, an urgent knocking came on the door. Al opened up to find Colin and Quinn, both looking highly disturbed.
“Uh, we got bad news,” said Quinn.
“I’d go with ‘catastrophic,’ personally,” added Colin, as he held the Reality Lens up. “This thing’s not working. I think it may have been tampered with.”
Quinn grimaced. “Also, Nexus Quinn’s in the Waiting Room.”
John locked eyes with Al, and they both knew what to say next.
“Oh boy.”
“Once again: who are you?”
Sherri was fastened to a board, tilted slightly back, and her head was strapped down in a way that she wasn’t able to see what was going on directly below her. She had been kept in pitch darkness for a long time, though she had no clue exactly how long. It felt like days, but it had probably only been several hours, considering her hunger levels. Every so often, the lights would come on and this woman would show up to see if she was ready to talk.
Sherri narrowed her eyes. “Tooth fairy.”
The lady Kromagg, who she had heard addressed as ‘Commander Kasyr,’ scowled at her.
“It’s only going to get worse. Do yourself a favour and talk now.” She brushed a wisp of brown hair from her face.
Sherri noted that this Kasyr was the only Kromagg who had hair on their head. It may have been a sex-related trait, she figured.
“Gee, you’re good at this,” said Sherri, feigning being impressed. “It’s true: I am not, in fact, the tooth fairy. Alas, my carefully constructed front has been torn down. Brava.”
The mockery only made the woman more angry.
“You realise we can get into your head, don’t you?”
Sherri kept her face blank. “So why haven’t you?”
“Don’t tempt them, Sherri…” John’s voice filled Maggie with relief, and she smiled as he came into her limited field of view.
“Just say the word and we’ll retrieve you,” he said, biting his lip as he looked upon her.
“What are you smiling about?” Kasyr barked.
“Just deciding on what I’m gonna eat for lunch. Big club sandwich, I’m thinking.”
“Oh, I’ve had enough of this,” the woman said, turning around. “Next time this door opens, expect a little more pain. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
She shut the door behind her, and the lights went out again. John adjusted his projection so Sherri was able to see his face.
“I don’t know how to get you out of this one, Sherri,” John said, voice shaking. “Are you sure you don’t want Higgins to–”
“Not yet,” she whispered. “I’ll keep looking for an opening to fight my way out of here.”
Defeated, John nodded. “Alright. But just say the word, okay? And if you can’t speak, send a couple of winks my way.”
“I will,” she promised. “Listen, can you go see what Quinn’s up to?”
“You got it. Sit tight, Sherri.”
“Don’t worry about me for now. I’m okay.”
* * *
Sam listened as Tim told a story of his time at the re-education facility, enduring countless hours of psychological torture.
While others had come and gone; broken down mentally, and turned compliant, Tim had been defiant and unyielding.
Eventually, the Kromaggs changed tack on those few who remained unbroken. Giving up on brainwashing, they turned to bargaining. They tempted Tim with false promises of a free life with Belinda. All he would have to do would be to sniff out free thinkers among the ranks of the slaves.
So, he had spent several years moving from one slave unit to another, occasionally finding someone who had ideas of escape. Each time, he’d be rewarded with a day or two in a nice bed, with a proper meal, and promised if he kept it up just a little longer, he’d see Belinda again.
Then he’d met Sherri, by far the most spirited slave he’d ever encountered. The Kromaggs had advised him to keep tabs on her. When she’d begun her escape, they told him to follow, opening the doors so he could catch up to her.
They were curious about this blind woman with designs of escape, so they let it happen. The dead Kromaggs were acceptable casualties, apparently.
They were not unseen during their escape; they were deliberately ignored.
The Kromaggs had tech that allowed them to track mammalian heat signatures, so they had been able to keep tabs on the pair of them the whole way to Quinn.
I guess that’s what made it so easy.
Sam clasped his hands together as he sat hunched over.
“And you told them all those secrets Sherri told you, didn’t you?”
Tim pursed his lips. “Not entirely.”
Sam raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”
Tim leaned over, whispering: “They don’t know ’bout John.”
This was Tim’s first mention of John. Sam wondered if he’d told Quinn anything about him. Erring on the safe side, he remained silent, waiting for Tim to elaborate.
“She said she has some guy only she can see, who can communicate with her. Betcha he’s figuring out some kinda rescue right now.”
Sam smiled. “Yeah, I think you may be right.”
As if in response to this, the Imaging Chamber door sounded. Sam followed his ear, and watched Al jump through the door, just on the other side of the electrical field.
Al either ignored it or didn’t see it, as he hurried into the cell, causing the field to ripple around him, giving Sam and Tim a clear view of his shape as he passed through.
“Sam, we got a prob–” he hesitated as he noticed the disruption of the field, then glanced at Tim, who was staring at it in surprise. “Oh. Oops.”
Sam rubbed his forehead, sighing.
“Uh, never mind that for a second,” Al said, “’cause we just found out someone threw the Reality Lens config out of whack. Meaning…”
Anyone could be a leaper.
“Oh, boy.”
“That’s what I said!”
Tim jumped to his feet, pointing at the force field. “You saw that, right?”
Sam looked at him, and nodded.
“It must be John!”
* * *
It hadn’t been John, of course. But John had, in fact, been watching the whole thing.
He’d listened to Tim’s story – or at least, some of it. It had already been happening when he blinked in.
He’d seen the figure in the force field. Just like it would have looked like if he’d passed through it himself.
And then, he’d heard Nexus Quinn, notably unfazed by the strange phenomenon, come out with the phrase ‘oh boy.’
It couldn’t be. Could it?
“It must be John!” exclaimed Tim.
“Nope, wasn’t me,” John said. “But I’m right here, so go ahead and think that.”
He moved close to Quinn, studying him.
“I don’t know how it could be true, but… what if it is?” John mumbled, watching closely as Quinn stared at a wall, with an unusual level of concentration. He then bit his thumbnail, as he leaned back in his seat, apparently lost in thought.
“Hi John,” Tim said, looking near the cell entrance. “Are you here to help us escape?”
Silence ensued.
“What, you expect to hear my answer?” asked John. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“If he is here, what makes you think he can answer?” Quinn asked. “You said only Sherri could see him.”
“Yeah, exactly…” John agreed.
Tim deflated. “Guess you’re right. Still, he can hear us. I think.”
Quinn gave a distracted grunt in reply, his eyes turning toward the back of the cell.
“Dammit,” he whispered, almost imperceptibly.
It sure did seem like he might have been engaged in a mostly one-sided conversation with a hologram. John had been the more vocal half of plenty of conversations just like this.
Please… tell me I’m right. Tell me this is Sam.
Quinn stood. “We need to get out of here,” he announced.
Tim looked up at him, brow furrowed.
“Ain’t like I don’t agree, but…” he gestured broadly. “Not really any way outta here.”
“Yeah, well, that just means we need to come up with a plan. Sherri did it. We can, too.”
“Nobody expected an old lady with no eyes,” said Tim. “We’re two grown men. They won’t let their guard down for us.”
Quinn paced the room.
“Well, if John’s really here, maybe he can distract them.”
John grinned. “Be happy to.”
Tim’s mouth drifted open. “I never told you ’bout him distracting the ’maggs.”
Quinn stiffened.
John raised his eyebrows.
“Well, uh, if he can affect the electronic field like that, we could certainly use that as a distraction, couldn’t we?”
“Hmm, good save,” John said, squinting at ‘Quinn.’
“Good idea,” Tim said, nodding. “John, I hope you’ve been listening…”
“I have,” John replied. “I’ll help whatever way I can, so long as you rescue Sherri.”
In the force field, the fuzzy shape of a hand giving a ‘thumbs up’ gesture appeared.
John’s heart pounded. “If that’s you, Al… I don’t know how you got here, but thank you.”
He moved to the field, and mirrored the hand gesture, eyes trained on ‘Quinn.’ As anticipated, Quinn’s eyebrows shot up and his mouth curled into a smile. He gave a surreptitious wink.
It’s him. It’s Sam.
The Waiting Room door slid open, and Quinn sheepishly poked his head in, locking eyes with his double, wearing the aura of Sam. He was sitting on a sofa that he’d managed to make ascend from the floor.
“Hey man, you comfy in here? Sorry to keep you waiting, we just had a crisis to sort out.”
Nexus Quinn was leaning forward, elbows resting on his thighs and hands clasped. He stared daggers at Quinn.
“Why have you brought me here?”
Quinn passed through the doorway, and it slammed shut behind him. “Sorry about all this,” he said. “On the bright side, you’re not in the Kromagg prison now, right?”
“Yeah. I appear to be in some other prison, instead.” Nexus Quinn stood from his seat, crossing his arms. “What’s your game? You somehow switched me out with some kind of secret agent, like what happened with Stephanie?”
Quinn gave him a nod. “Yeah, something like that. But it’s only because you… really screwed up. Hall of Fame kind of screwed up. I mean, I’ve met some screw-up Quinns in my time, but you really take the screw-up cake.”
“Okay, I get the picture!”
Quinn chuckled.
“Just trying to describe the gravity of the situation you’ve caused here. We’re your cleanup crew, so to speak.” He paused, before adding: “Nice to see you again, by the way.”
He held a hand out, and the double didn’t make a move to accept the handshake. Instead, he took a step back.
“We’ve met?”
“Yeah. I’ve run into you more than once, but you’d only remember the first time, I suppose. You chewed out my physics professor, got me fired, and, uh… oh yeah. Kissed my best friend. That made things awkward for a while, so thanks a lot.”
A look of surprise and realisation dawned over Nexus Quinn.
“Wait, that was you?” He squinted, studying Quinn’s face. “Why do you look so…?”
“Old?” Quinn snorted. “Because I’m twenty-nine.”
As he waited for his double to process this information, Quinn took a seat on the sofa, casually crossing a leg over his knee.
“It’s kind of exciting to talk to you when you’re the one who doesn’t know what’s going on. I like it.” He patted the seat beside him. “Come on, have a seat. Let’s talk.”
The Quinn double gingerly took a seat, regarding Quinn with great suspicion.
“So, let’s start with why your reflection looks like that, and go from there.”
* * *
Quinn explained as much as he could think to explain. He was certain that if Nexus Quinn would just have the full picture, he’d understand why all of this was happening, and why it was necessary.
After what he guessed to have been several hours, he finally concluded.
“You’ve had whole teams of people dedicating the best years of their lives to undoing your mistake. So the least you could do is accept the help.”
The two sat, wordlessly staring, after this final comment. Nexus Quinn was looking intensely down at his hands, their laced fingers fidgeting as his mind raced. After a minute, he broke the silence.
“Why did this guy replace me after I was already locked up in a cell? What makes you think he’ll be any better at escaping than I might have been?”
Quinn stood, stretching. “He’s been doing this a long time. He’ll find a way.”
“And until then, what, I just gotta hang out in this place and wait?” Nexus Quinn screwed up his face. “Surely you’re enough like me to know I get restless if I’m not doing something.”
Quinn nodded. “I know, I know. That’s why I actually do have a task you can help us with.”
He called up to the ceiling. “Ziggy, could you page Colin for me? Need him in here.”
Ziggy’s voice responded: “Very well, but I’d rather not be treated as a glorified switchboard operator.”
“Aw, I’m sorry, Zigs. At least it’s a change from playing butler to our guest here.”
Nexus Quinn stared at the ceiling. “Who is that you’re talking to?”
“Ziggy is the MVP of this place.” Quinn leaned down toward his double, whispering: “Make nice with her, or she’ll find ways to make your stay here difficult.”
He straightened, noting Nexus Quinn’s worried look.
“That isn’t a threat, mind you. Just a heads up.” He winked. “She might be a computer, but she has feelings. So keep her happy.”
As the seated Quinn puzzled out the idea of a computer with an emotional temperament, the door of the Waiting Room opened to Colin, carrying the Reality Lens. He waved to the two Quinns as the door shut behind him.
“Hey, how’s it going?” he said, regarding Nexus Quinn nervously. “I’m Quinn’s brother, Colin.”
“Huh…” the double looked at Quinn, his eyebrows meeting. “I didn’t know you had a brother.”
He rubbed his chin. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen a double of us with a brother. I remember one with a sister, though.”
Colin and Quinn exchanged a glance.
“Well, our family history is a little complex,” said Colin, before holding up the Reality Lens. “Anyway, we need your assistance in fixing this. Needs re-calibration so we can see the real you. Though I’m not sure if it would be weirder to see my brother or my professor when I look at you, honestly.”
Nexus Quinn’s eyes lit up. “Oh, cool! Let me see that thing.”
He stood, reaching for it. Colin pulled it away, and held out his free hand defensively.
“Hey now, hold up! This thing is my baby. Be gentle, okay?”
Nexus Quinn gave him a look. “You think I won’t be delicate with a piece of tech I’ve never seen?”
Colin narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been a dick to just about everyone, including your own wife. I’d be stupid to trust you.”
Nexus Quinn scowled. “All I did was cheat on her. You guys… or who was it? John? Kidnapped her.”
“Oh, is that all you did?” Colin stepped closer, menacing. “I think you’re forgetting you also got her killed. Then again, that’s easy to forget when you also got billions of others killed, right?”
Quinn’s double scowled. “All I did was make a miscalculation. You can’t hang all those deaths on me! They haven’t even happened yet!”
“It’s 2003. They’ve been happening for years.” Colin’s eyes were narrow lines. “You know, the older version of you my brother met actually owned up to his responsibilities.”
Quinn stepped between the two, pushing them apart. “Whoa now, let’s all take a chill pill.”
He turned his head to Colin. “Not helping, bro.”
His gaze shifted to Nexus Quinn. “Look, I’m not here to start shovelling blame onto you for what’s happened. I’ve made some mistakes too, and I know how much it eats me up inside. The older you I met was proof that it’ll do the same to you, if you let it. So let’s just put that aside and work together for now.”
He looked back to his brother. “Let him look at it. I’m sure he wants to see how it works.”
Colin sighed, and handed the Lens to Nexus Quinn. “It’s called a Reality Lens, and its main function is to penetrate a spacetime distortion that alters how something or someone is perceived. Don’t drop it.”
As the leapee began to inspect the device, Quinn gave his brother a pat on the back. “What was that? You don’t usually lose your temper. Thought you were about to smack him one.”
Colin’s mouth straightened to a line. “Sorry. I just couldn’t help thinking about… everything… that was a direct result of his actions. Guess I got carried away.”
He glanced at Nexus Quinn, who was sitting on the couch, still absorbed in studying the Lens. “I think maybe if he didn’t look like Sam, I might’ve actually hit him.”
“Wait. You mean if he looked like me you would have hit him?”
“Exactly.”
Quinn stared a moment at his brother, whose expressionless facade eventually collapsed into a laugh.
“Oh my god, you looked so worried,” he said, grinning.
Quinn shook his head in exasperation. “Who needs to be beaten up when you can hurt me in other ways?”
Colin shot Quinn a triumphant look, and threw an arm around his shoulders. “Come on, let’s get this over with.”
John paced the halls of the Project, restless. Al had been in the Imaging Chamber for a few hours, and he just wanted some word of what was happening. He couldn’t think of anything else; not even the terrifying news about the Reality Lens, which in itself was disastrous.
As he walked, he failed to notice a door open just by him, and he walked directly into Donna, who was leaving her office.
“Oh, sorry,” he said, as she stumbled back, looking at him with surprise. “Donna, right?”
Donna gave him a tense nod. “Y-yeah.”
He could tell she was uncomfortable looking at him, and he stepped back, giving her space.
“So, uh… you’ve been avoiding me, haven’t you?”
“No, no…” Her cheeks turned red.
John chuckled. “Sure you have. And I get it. It’s gotta be weird.”
Donna sighed. “Okay, fine. It’s weird.”
John held up his hands. “Well, don’t worry about me. I’m not gonna move in on Sam’s turf or anything. You’re quite safe from that kind of awkwardness.”
Donna stifled a laugh.
“Oh, I know,” she said, eyes dancing. “I’m not worried about anything of the sort. I’m only avoiding you because it’s just hard to look at you without thinking of Sam, knowing he might not be coming back.”
She shook her head. “Always avoided the Waiting Room for the same reason.”
“I’m sorry,” said John, giving her a sympathetic look. “Did he give you a proper goodbye this time, at least?”
She nodded, avoiding his eye. “Couldn’t have asked for more.”
“Except for him not to leave?”
“Humph. What’s that Spock quote about the needs of the many?” She shrugged, acting nonchalant, though John could see it was an act. “He has a job to do.”
John smiled, understanding.
Finally, she looked him in the eye. “Do you think the new code will work?”
“I sure hope so,” he said, scuffing his foot on the floor. “If not, someone’s going to have to hang back in the Waiting Room for babysitting duties after this place is mothballed.”
The code to which Donna was referring was a late addition, written with the intention of combining leaper and leapee in a state of entanglement. Not like the two Maggies or Quinns had been, exactly, though Sam had used that as a basis for their work. Instead, they had configured it so that the mind of the leapee would relinquish consciousness for the duration of the leap.
However, it was entirely untested. It was to be activated if – and only if – retrieval failed.
Sam had also toyed with the idea of leaping as himself, which he had apparently done twice before, but he hadn’t known how, and he’d attributed it to his higher power concept.
“You don’t think the retrieval will bring him back, do you?” her voice was strained.
He placed a gentle hand on her arm. “I don’t know. It worked the last time, right? But he wanted to come back then. So I guess we prepare for all scenarios. Hope for the best, expect the worst.”
Donna flinched. “Sam said the same thing. It’s why we didn’t go through with a divorce, but also why he took out a life insurance policy.”
She gave him a wry smile. “Of course, if I were to ever make the claim, you’re going to have to be out of the picture, too.”
“If my Earth is saved, I do intend to return there.” John mirrored her smile. “But if not, you might be stuck with me a while.”
“Guess I’ll have to suck it up,” she said. “Just going to have to think of you as his brother or something.”
She turned to leave, and hesitated, looking back.
“Speaking of brothers, you haven’t met my brother Jack, have you?”
Huh?
“No, why?”
Donna awkwardly stared at the floor. “No reason… unless… well, you’re both bachelors. He might be able to take you for a night on the town some time.”
John looked at her, puzzled. “Do I strike you as a ‘night on the town’ kind of guy?”
“You strike me as a… lonely kind of guy.”
John’s cheeks began to burn. “Me? No, I’m fine. I have lots going on. Heck, I’m surrounded by people all the time.”
Donna let out a deep breath. “Okay, let me be a little more blunt. You don’t look at women the same way Sam does. I’m just wondering if maybe you’re…”
“Oh…” John’s eyes went wide, and he turned away from her, rubbing the back of his neck. “Jeez, I didn’t know it was that obvious.”
“So I’m right?”
John hung his head. “Okay, yes. I’m gay.”
“There’s nothing wrong with–”
“Oh, I know all that,” said John, turning back towards Donna. “I lived in San Francisco for twenty years. It’s not a big deal, in theory. I’ve just spent my life… doing other things. Important things. You should know, right? Putting your love life on hold and all.”
Donna smiled at him, but her eyes were sad.
“Yeah, I get it.” She took his hand. “You should meet Jack, anyway. You might at least make a friend.”
Well, it couldn’t hurt.
“Alright. If you insist.”
At that moment, Al emerged from the Imaging Chamber. John and Donna turned towards him.
“How are things going in there?” asked John, feeling his anxiety rising. “Is Sherri alright?”
Al shook his head. “Haven’t seen her. But you–” he pointed a finger at John, “–should be getting a few new memories any second now.”
“Already?” John tilted his head as he thought back. “Wait… oh… you’re right…”
He laughed as he recalled Quinn muttering ‘oh boy.’
“Huh. So this is what it’s like to have my personal history change on the fly.”
“Gives you the willies, don’t it?”
John nodded, as his ensuing memories of his time on that leap started to lose focus. Not being used to forgetting anything, his heart began to race at the realisation.
“Wow…” he mumbled, clutching his head, “the rest of the leap must be in flux now. Is my memory going to be like this until Sam leaps out?”
“Yeah, ’fraid so, pal.” Al gave him a pat on the back. “Don’t worry too much; Ziggy’s tracking the changes. Whatever you forget will be in the report later.”
John met eyes with Donna, who had a knowing look on her face.
“Sam’s done this to us, on a large scale, numerous times,” she said. “It’s just something you get used to. My advice is, don’t think about it too hard.”
“Well that’s easier said than done,” John said, prompting Al to chuckle.
“Welcome to the club.”
* * *
Maggie hoist the cordless phone to her ear as she stirred the pasta on the stove, and looked out into the common room, where Rembrandt watched Passions, Sammy Jo typed something on a laptop, and Alia stood at a punching bag in the corner, letting out her frustrations with violent strikes.
And finally, leaning upright against a wall, stood Tom; his arms folded as he watched her.
She turned her attention to the phone. “What’s up, Quinn?”
“So, we’ve got a, uh, troubling situation over here.”
Maggie let go of the spoon, and it slumped against the side of the cooking pot.
“Did something go wrong? Is Uncle Sam alright?”
“No, Sam’s okay, I think. It’s about the Reality Lens.”
As Quinn described the situation to her, she felt herself break into a cold sweat.
“Tell me this is a joke, Quinn…”
“It isn’t a joke.”
“So… what… anyone could be…?”
“Almost anyone. We’ve ruled out John, Sam, and Al for reasons related to the Imaging Chamber. Wouldn’t work right if it wasn’t them. But until we can fix the Lens, we can’t trust anyone else.”
Maggie felt her stomach churn. “I see.”
“And that’s why you need to let everyone there know while I’m still on the line… you know… just in case you’re the impostor.”
Maggie frowned. “I guess that’s fair.”
She pulled the phone from her face. “Hey everyone? In case you felt relaxed today, I have some bad news.”
Alia gazed down into the steaming ripples of her tea as she listened to the din of the San Antonio tavern around her. The layers of voices held a certain comfort. Safety in numbers.
Nonetheless, she also felt alone. With John busy at the Project – where she was understandably unwelcome – she had nobody to trust. So she had to get out of that place. So she went to the only place she knew would have a smattering of strangers.
But, even now, she felt vulnerable. It was this very town where the energy surge had been detected.
Her eyes moved from face to face around her. Nobody was looking at her.
Good.
With trembling hands, she drew the tea cup to her lips and sipped.
“Hey.”
She choked on the tea, as a hand landed on her shoulder from behind. She whipped her head around to see Rembrandt smiling at her.
“Uh, sorry, did I scare you?”
Alia placed down her cup, as she recovered. “Maybe a little. I’m just on edge.”
The singer took a seat across from her at the table, and looked at her with a sympathetic smile.
“Yeah, things just got a bit paranoid, didn’t they?” He bit his lip, reading her nervous expression. “Look, if you came here for some space, I can go.”
He made a move to stand.
“No, it’s alright,” she said. “I’m scared, but I’d also appreciate a little company, I guess.”
She glanced around the bar. “I don’t think much can happen to me with this many people around,” she added.
He settled back into his seat. “Alright. If I make you uncomfortable, just say the word and I’m gone.”
Alia offered him a weak smile. “I appreciate that.”
Rembrandt took a salt shaker from the centre of the table, and started turning it in his hand.
“You think they’re gonna get the Lens fixed up?” he asked, as his hands passed the small glass shaker from one hand to the other.
“That’s what they promised.” She took another sip of her tea.
“Let’s hope so. Kinda hard to be around everyone right now, huh? That’s why I came here, too.” He let out a laugh. “Maybe I been watching too many soap operas. Everything someone does, I look at ’em and think ‘hmm, is that in character?’ But I think I’m just working myself up.”
“I guess you’d know better than me. I don’t know anyone well enough to pick out things of that nature.”
Rembrandt sank his head into his hands, leaving the salt shaker on its side, a few white grains scattered around it.
“What’s the future like?” he asked without warning.
“Huh?” Alia asked as she tried to understand the train of thought that had led him to asking that.
“Just been wanting to ask, ever since our last chat. You’re from 2023, you said. So you must know all kinds of things that are gonna happen.”
“Talk about a change of subject.” Alia couldn’t help but let out a giggle.
But I guess it’ll relax me a little.
“Well, what kind of things do you wanna know?”
He leaned in toward her, whispering. “Been hearing the government is planning some kind of war in Iraq. That true?”
Alia groaned. “You had to start with that? Oh yeah, that happens, and it’ll be just as much of a mess as you might imagine. Based on lies, too.”
Rembrandt winced. “Okay, I’ll try something less heavy… how about music? Disco ever make a comeback?”
Alia screwed up her face as she thought back. “I don’t think so, but I’m not a big music person. I think it skipped from funk revival to eighties revival.”
“Damn shame,” he said, shaking his head. “Had me some good times at the discotheque.”
“After the pandemic of 2020, people did a bit less intermingling on dance floors,” said Alia, and waited for his shocked expression.
“Pandemic? You’re kiddin’ me, right?”
Alia forced a laugh. “Uh. Yeah. Just yanking your chain…”
She didn’t really want to get into all that. In fact, those twenty years had not had a lot of highlights, in retrospect. Recessions, political chaos, hatred, economic inequality. She had to wonder how much of that had been a result of meddling by her fellow leapers.
“Oh, there’s one thing that goes right,” she finally said, after shuffling through her memories. “Same sex marriage becomes legal in a lot of places. Eventually. Though, things get worse in other ways…”
Rembrandt raised an eyebrow. “Sounds like the future ain’t got much to offer, huh?”
“Yeah, I guess so. But at least there are smartphones! They’re like whole computers built into your phone, connected wirelessly to the internet. You can talk to… abusive people on the internet… whenever you want.” Alia deflated. “You know what? I’m not looking forward to reliving the next couple decades.”
She leaned back in her chair, considering her predicament. “That’s if I live that long.”
“You really think these guys want to…?” Rembrandt drew a line across his throat.
“Oh, definitely. Well, they’ll probably want to torture me first.” Alia spoke plainly, resigned to the notion.
Rembrandt frowned. “You said they were victims like you. What if they want outta there as much as you did?”
Alia considered this.
I suppose they would never have admitted it to me, not while we were under that sort of scrutiny.
“All of us are… very damaged people. I don’t know how any of the others would react to the offer to escape, to be completely honest.”
Though I have an inkling about Zoey’s reaction.
“And I couldn’t offer that anyway,” she added. “I don’t even know how it happened to me to begin with.”
Rembrandt gazed into the distance, lost in thought. “That’s too bad.”
* * *
“Aha! There you are!” Quinn cried, overcome with relief as he peered into the Reality Lens.
The man who had looked like Sam a moment ago, had finally shifted into the form of a younger Quinn, as Colin painstakingly turned a screwdriver micrometre by micrometre, tuning into exactly the right wavelength to nullify the aura.
“Oh, thank god,” Colin breathed, closing up the tiny hatch on the side of the device, and wiping his brow. Quinn held it out to him.
“Give it to John and we can finally put our minds at ease.”
“Got it,” Colin said. “Do you really plan on staying in here with… you?”
Quinn shrugged. “Only as long as he has questions. And I’m pretty sure he has many. Get going.”
“Okay, I’m going.” He strode towards the door, which Ziggy opened as he approached. He left, with the parting words: “Thank you, Ziggy.”
* * *
Sam rubbed his eyes, a welcome relief from staring at the ceiling of the cell.
It had been a frustrating hour, with Al being gone, and some attempts at communicating with John that hadn’t been very fruitful. He wasn’t even sure if John remained here at present.
He glanced over at Tim on the other bench, whose head was resting on the wall as he sat, trying to think of a way to escape.
And finally, the sound of the Imaging Chamber door heralded Al’s return.
“Good news, Sam,” he said, emerging through the wall. “The Reality Lens is functional again. John’s off checking everyone as we speak.”
Sam breathed a sigh of relief. This had been quite a fiasco. Of all the things to be discovered after he’d left, he could scarcely think of anything worse.
“Listen, don’t be worrying about all that. We’ll take care of it. You worry about getting outta this cage, alright?”
Sam looked at him expectantly.
Well? How do I do that?
“I’m working on it, okay? Ziggy’s just gotta locate Sherri and we can run some scenarios.”
Okay. I’ll just… be here, then.
Sam turned his attention to the force field. “John? You still here? Which way to Sherri?”
After a moment, the shape of a hand appeared, pointing downward.
“Well, that’s a start. Thanks, buddy.”
“Good thinking,” Al said, giving an approving nod. “I’ll tell Ziggy to start scanning below us, and I’ll just go have a look around myself.”
He pressed a button on the handlink, and began slowly lowering into the floor as if he was on an elevator. He waved, as his image disappeared into the concrete.
“Okay, everyone line up in front of me, single file. Shouldn’t be a long process, so don’t fight for a spot, okay?”
The dummy warehouse was, unusually, full of people: Project staffers, security, and those from the depths of the facility below the warehouse.
John pulled open the Reality Lens, and held it over his eye as the crowd queued up before him.
First in line stood Gooshie, who John understood was more or less Project Quantum Leap’s version of Will: programmer, tech guy, workaholic, just a little neurotic.
“I don’t know why I’m nervous,” he said, dabbing at his forehead with a handkerchief. “I’m ninety-eight per cent certain I am who I think I am. But there is a minor chance I’m a leaper that’s so heavily psycho-synergised that I’ve forgotten my own identity.”
“Well, I suppose that’s not completely outside the realm of possibility,” John said, suppressing laughter.
The image within the Lens matched John’s own perception, and he gave the little guy a thumbs up.
“Well, don’t worry about that, Gooshie. You’re good to go. Next, please!”
Gooshie let out a held breath, and stepped away, where an already-checked Donna confirmed his security credentials in her wristlink, allowing him clearance back into the Project.
Doctor Beeks was the next in line.
“My door’s still open,” she said, as John confirmed her identity. “Any time, you can come talk to me. Really.”
John gave her a look.
“Why is everyone trying to analyse me lately?” He gave a pointed glance at Donna. “You’re clear.”
Verbena stepped towards Donna, and they exchanged a look.
“We care about you very much,” Donna said. “That’s all.”
John frowned, and turned back to the line-up. One by one, each person was cleared. After a while, Sammy Jo met eyes with him.
“Oh, hey,” she said, awkwardly twirling a lock of her hair.
John found himself grinning at her without realising he’d been doing it. It was the first he’d seen of her since hearing the bizarre, but exciting, news that Sam had fathered her during a leap.
“Well hi. I heard what happened… you doing okay?” he said, looking into the Reality Lens, and seeing that she was who she said she was.
She contemplated his question for a moment. “Mixed feelings, I guess. It’s a shame I wasn’t able to get to know him before he had to leave again.”
“Yeah, that must be tough. Well, if there are any questions you wish you’d asked… I may be able to help. Not on everything, of course.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” she said. “Am I cleared?”
John nodded, gesturing towards Donna. She moved toward her new stepmother.
“Doctor Elesee…” she said. Donna smiled.
“For years I’ve been trying to get you to address me as Donna,” she said. “If ever there was a time, it’s now that you know about your father.”
Sammy Jo bowed her head. “Alright, alright. Donna. Listen… I’m sorry about my security breach last week.”
“Sammy, if Sam had been a bit more proactive, like I wanted, you’d never have needed to resort to that. So let’s call it even.”
She hugged Sammy Jo, before tapping the wristlink and reactivating her security clearance.
John turned back to the dwindling queue, and his eyes popped open when he saw Tom.
“Tom? I thought you’d have already left now that Sam’s gone.” He lowered the Reality Lens. “I don’t think we even need to scan you, do we?”
Tom smiled. “Maggie invited me.”
So she took my advice after all.
He continued: “And all I heard was that everyone needed checking, so here I am.”
John shrugged, and held the Lens to his eye.
“Yeah, you’re all good.” He lowered it, and re-established eye contact with the man his own brother might have become. “When you’re done with Maggie, I… I think I’d like to spend some time with you, too.”
“I think that can be arranged,” said Tom, patting John on the shoulder, before turning to Donna.
“How are you holding up since Sam left again?” he asked her.
“Oh, I’m a trooper. It’s back to the status quo, really.”
John tuned out the rest of their conversation as he looked to the next in line. Maggie winked as he checked her over.
“Can you imagine if there was some leaper trying to figure out my family dynamics when my alternate universe Dad showed up? Oh boy, they’d have their work cut out.”
John chuckled. “Yeah, I heard Sam was a little bewildered when he leaped into you instead of Sherri.”
“Even Ziggy was bewildered,” she said with an amused grin.
“You’re clear,” John said with a resolute nod. He would have hoped he’d know a real Maggie if he saw one, by now.
She moved aside to Donna, who fished her warehouse keycard from a crate beside her. Attached was an envelope, which Donna pointed to.
“This has the new access PINs for your rooms below,” she explained.
“Thanks,” Maggie said, accepting the offering, and joining Tom as the two of them walked away. John noted they were walking quite closely together, and he smiled at the possibilities that closeness suggested.
John turned back to the queue, and noted just a few military guys he didn’t know remained.
He leaned toward Donna. “Where are Alia and Rembrandt?”
Donna’s brow furrowed as she noted she hadn’t returned their keycards.
“I don’t know. But I think they’re… the only ones left.”
Why do I have a bad feeling about this?
* * *
Huh? What happened?
Alia’s eyes fluttered open to see a dark, starry sky. She was lying on a dusty surface, but it was too dark to see anything but the sky, and the far off horizon with the hint of a glow.
I’m in the desert?
With a start, she realised that the last thing she remembered was approaching her motorcycle.
She attempted to sit up, and found her head was overcome with pain.
Well that may explain how I lost consciousness…
“You really don’t know how you escaped, huh?” Rembrandt’s voice was shaky.
Alia turned her head to see the dimly lit silhouette sitting on the ground beside her.
“Rembrandt…?”
“Oh, come on, Alia. You’re not stupid. I was the one other person who left after we all found out the Reality Lens was being fixed.”
Alia let out a breath. She hadn’t wanted to believe it.
The mystery leaper was passing a revolver between their hands, in a similar fashion to the way she’d seen them with the salt shaker earlier. Each movement made the moonlight glint off the gun when it hit certain angles.
“I’m surprised nobody worked it out,” the leaper continued. “Everyone seemed so preoccupied. Never looked twice at the guy watching a stupid show on TV all day.”
“Which one are you?” Alia asked, finally reaching a sitting position.
It can’t be Zoey, they’re not acting like her at all.
“…Thames?”
“Just because I leaped into a black man, you think I’m Thames? Alia… really.”
“Well then… who?”
The silhouette of Rembrandt paused for a moment.
“Okay, okay. You were right the first time.” Thames laughed. “Lucky guess.”
He peered into the chamber of his gun, then closed it with a click.
He’s going to kill me. How can I buy time?
“What happened to Zoey?”
“Oh come on, straight to Zoey? No, ‘how have you been, Thames?’ Alia, I’m hurt.” He climbed to his feet, looming over her. “Who cares about Zoey? What about you and me?”
He placed a finger under her chin, tilting her face upward. “When I saw you on New Years Eve I could hardly believe it. Lothos had no clue you’d show up. He thought you were being handed to us on a silver platter.”
“And what did you think?” She wrenched her chin away from his hand, at the expense of a wave of pain.
“Me?” he turned away, looking up at the moon. “I saw an opportunity.”
He reached into his pocket, and produced a quartz crystal.
“I was here to get my hands on these things,” he said, holding it up so it caught the light. “Lothos wanted sliding tech, and the enhanced retrieval, as described in Senator Grady’s old correspondence with his, uh, benefactors. See, it only showed up in those records recently, so Lothos knew it was a major find.”
With a grunt, Thames threw the crystal into the distance with as much force as he could muster.
“Fuck that.”
Alia’s eyes grew wide.
He’s defying Lothos?
Thames dropped to his knees. “Alia, I need your help.”
Sherri gave Kasyr a wide, joyless grin as the Kromagg burst into the room, and switched on the lights.
“Ah, you came back,” she cooed, doing her best to hide her anxiety. “You really care about me, don’t you?”
Kasyr didn’t reply, opting instead to stare at her, arms folded over her chest, as two more Kromaggs entered the room. One, a soldier, was carrying a heavy-looking machine by a handle, which he placed on the floor to her right. The other, who wore a lab coat, moved to her left.
“Is that a boombox?” Sherri asked. “Hey, can you play the Spice Girls?”
Kasyr’s head fell to one side. “I don’t know what nonsense you’re spouting. But it doesn’t matter.”
She nodded to the soldier. “Activate it.”
Sherri couldn’t see what was happening, but after hearing a few switches being flipped, the air around her filled with an unpleasant static energy. Unpleasant, but not painful per se.
“Tuning…” said the soldier. The energy around Sherri seemed to shift in a way that she couldn’t describe, but it gave her a tingling sensation in her extremities.
Then, all at once, it felt like a lightning bolt struck her. She cried out as a pain shot through her, and then subsided.
Sherri laughed. “I’ve had worse.”
She wasn’t lying, either. When she’d been merged with Maggie, the continuous pain towards the end had been on a scale far greater than whatever that had been.
“We weren’t trying to cause you pain just now,” Kasyr said. “That was just a bonus.”
She approached Sherri, looking at her intently.
“So that’s what you really look like. Fascinating.”
What did they do to me?
Sherri grimaced, squirming in her shackles.
“Ah, that wiped the smile off your face, didn’t it?” Kasyr laughed; a smug, mean-spirited laugh that bared teeth, but left her eyes without light in them. “Whatever cloaking technology you’re using is close enough to our own perception alteration that we’ve been able to adapt our nullification field to you.”
She stepped back, gesturing to the Kromagg to Sherri’s left.
“You can’t be from this Earth. But, you didn’t come here with Quinn, either. Where is your Transdimensional Facilitator? It must be hidden somewhere.”
“Trans what?” Sherri genuinely didn’t know what she was talking about.
Kasyr sighed. “I believe Quinn calls it his ‘timer.’”
Sherri’s smile returned. “Oh.”
They don’t know I got here without one.
“Oh, you know. It’s hidden somewhere in that other tree. Good luck finding it.”
Maybe this can buy me time.
Kasyr nodded towards the Kromagg in the lab coat, and Sherri’s head felt a strange sensation, as though there was a tongue licking her brain. She screwed up her face.
“Eww, what the hell?”
“Commander, there’s no TF device,” the Kromagg said.
He went into my head? Oh, not cool.
Sherri hadn’t come all this way without preparation, of course. She had learned numerous techniques to resist mental manipulation, but it wasn’t like she’d had a Kromagg around to train with. This was a new experience for her, and one she’d need to adapt to.
From Quinn’s notes, it didn’t seem like they could reach very far into a person’s mind. They could tell lies from truth, and perhaps read surface thoughts. Sherri would just have to keep her mind clear. Ignore the questions. Distract herself.
John would be useful right about now. Where is he?
“Who is ‘John?’” the mind-reading Kromagg asked.
Sherri winced, and forced herself to think about something else.
A movie. What’s a movie you’ve seen lately?
She filled her mind with scenes from Titanic. The Kromagg scowled, grunting in frustration.
“What is this garbage?”
“Garbage?” Sherri asked, with an innocent smile. “It’s only the highest grossing movie of all time.”
As she tried to hold on to the thoughts, the scenes kept slipping away from her mind. She wasn’t sure if it was through the effort of the Kromagg or simply that her memory was failing her. She scrambled to flip through her vast pop culture knowledge for more distractions.
Then, she heard music.
It wasn’t her mind, it was coming from somewhere else. A familiar three high-pitched notes that made Sherri’s heart jump.
Plink-plink-plink. Plink-plink-plink. It was a delicate, magical sound, and Sherri knew what was coming next.
“Come with me, and you’ll be…”
The knot in Sherri’s stomach unravelled as John stepped through the wall, dressed in a purple coat and brown top hat, and a large bow tie. He wore the same candy stripe trousers Al had given him.
“In a world of pure imagination…”
Gay Willy Wonka.
Slung over his shoulder hung a sparkling keytar, with which he played the three notes as he walked towards her.
Sherri grinned at him, and began to giggle. He winked back at her, his eyes gleaming with mischief.
“Take a look and you’ll see, into your imagination…”
The Kromagg in the lab coat faltered.
“What…” he said, struggling to comprehend what was happening.
Kasyr’s eyes, which had been locked on Sherri, drifted towards John for a moment, before she caught herself, and moved her gaze back to Sherri.
“We’ll begin with a spin, travelling in the world of my creation…”
“Something is interfering with my concentration, commander,” said the mind reader. “All I’m picking up is some… song?”
“What we’ll see will defy explanation.”
Kasyr lurched forward, her face stopping inches away from Sherri’s. “What are you doing?”
Sherri avoided her gaze, as John moved to her side and she watched him perform.
Between lines, John leaned in, whispering into her ear.
“You’re gonna be okay. Trust me. Just hold on a little longer.”
Despite everything, that whispered assurance was all it took to ease her mind.
John took a step back, and switched the instrument synth on the keytar from glockenspiel to strings.
“If you want to view paradise,” he sung in his pitch perfect falsetto, “Simply look around and view it…”
Kasyr’s head turned towards John again.
“What’s there?! Why do I keep looking at nothing?”
“Anything you want to, do it…”
The mind reader looked perplexed. “I can’t see anything, but for some reason I’m picturing a human with… a top hat?”
Sherri joined John’s performance, and together they sung the next lines.
“Want to change the world? There’s nothing to it…”
Kasyr grabbed the mind reader by the wrist.
“Get out of here,” she said, roughly pulling him towards the door. She turned to the soldier on the other side of the room. “You too. Leave, the both of you.”
The Kromaggs hurried out of the room, as the enraged woman slammed the door shut. She turned back around, rolling up her sleeves.
“I don’t know how you’re doing this, but let’s see if you can keep it up after I’m through.”
Sherri ignored her, keeping her gaze on John.
‘Hold on a little longer,’ he’d told her. Whatever he’d meant by that, that was exactly what she’d do.
“There is no life I know, to compare with pure imagination,” John sang, with Sherri quietly singing along.
A fist landed square in her stomach, winding her. She gasped for breath.
Ignore it. You’re not here. You’re with John.
John’s face flinched as the woman threw another punch.
Sherri kept her eyes glued to his, pleading silently for him to pretend with her that none of this was happening. He seemed to understand, and continued his song, looking away from the violence that he couldn’t stop.
“Living there, you’ll be free, if you truly wish to be.”
The pain of the beating dulled as Sherri began to dissociate. Each blow tried to pull her mind back to the pain, but the further her mind got away from it, the less difficult it was to resist feeling it.
By the time a fist to her head knocked her out cold, she didn’t feel a thing.
“What do you mean you need my help?”
Alia was thrown for a loop. Of all the possibilities she’d imagined when the leaper made themselves known, this had to be far, far down the list.
“Help. H-E-L-P. Assistance. Support. Surely you are familiar with the concept?” he flailed his arms, holding the gun by its barrel, before leaning in close to her, his hot breath against her cheek.
“Listen, bestie. Here’s the gossip around the water cooler back at base: Lothos has a big-time bounty on your head. And it’s not because he’s all heartbroken over your betrayal, it’s because of what you represent.”
He moved his lips to her ear, whispering. “Hope.”
Alia drew away from him, making eye contact. Thames’s wild eyes shone with a layer of what may have been tears.
“Lothos can’t have subordinates thinking there’s a way out, now can he? Killing you would be a clear message: defy him and die. But with you out here, alive? Well, maybe we all get some ideas. Maybe there’s a little mutiny. Maybe Lothos gets a hatchet to his bitch-ass motherboard.”
Thames flipped open his gun’s cylinder and let the bullets drop to the sand.
“Look, I’m running out of time. She’ll be back any minute.”
He grabbed a handful of sand and covered up the shining ammo, before closing the cylinder.
“She?”
Thames looked at Alia as if the answer was obvious. And, she figured, it must have been.
“Zoey,” she said with a sigh.
“Oh, Alia, as soon as she saw you, she was mega PO’d that she wasn’t the leaper. But there’s no time to get into that now.”
He grabbed her by the arms. “I can’t let her know I’m not dancing to her tune, if you catch my drift. Just play along. Pretend it’s a loaded gun, capisce?”
“Why should I?”
“Aliaaa, come onnn!” Thames whined. “I thought you were trying to be the hero now. I’m begging you to help me; surely you can’t turn away an old pal who wants to change.”
His white teeth glinted as he gave her a wide grin. “WWSD: What Would Sam Do?”
Of course Sam would help him. But Sam is too trusting.
“Thames, I want to help you, but I can’t believe a word you say. You realise that, don’t you?”
Thames gestured wildly at the ground. “I literally just buried all my bullets. You can probably take me in a straight fight. I saw you smacking around that punching bag earlier. Don’t really want to be on the receiving end of one of those punches.”
He clutched his head in frustration, as he struggled to make his case. “I’m laying it all out, here. What more do you want from me? I could prostrate myself, if that’s what you need.”
He began to lower himself to the ground.
“Stop,” Alia said, feeling intensely uncomfortable. “Fine, I’ll play along. But… we both have to be careful. Zoey is crafty. She… lurks. Sometimes I had no idea she was there.”
Thames rose back to a kneel, beaming.
“You don’t have to tell me. She lost her fitness to leap when your boy Beckett unloaded a shotgun into her chest, and I got stuck with her looking over my shoulder.” He pouted. “Much preferred it the other way round. Which, frankly, is not unrelated to our current exchange.”
Alia touched a finger to the sore spot on her head, just under her hairline by her left temple. She winced as it bloomed with pain.
“You didn’t need to hurt me.”
“What, you were planning to come quietly?” He shook his head. “You know the drill.”
Alia frowned as she recalled Zoey’s callous words: ‘Skip the fuss, just concuss.’
As though Zoey’s words in her mind somehow summoned her, Thames stiffened, and gave her a pointed glance, before aiming the gun at her, and climbing to his feet. His expression shifted back to one of irreverence as he turned his head towards wherever Zoey had emerged.
“Evening, Z-Dog. Me and Alia were just having a catch-up sesh.”
“Z-Dog?” Alia said with a snort. “Oh Zoey, is that what you’re letting him call you?”
Thames smirked. “Oh, she hates it. But what’s she gonna do? Hit me?”
With a childish smile, he poked his tongue out in the direction of the hologram, who Alia imagined must have been fuming.
At one time I would have been able to see her too. They must have cut me out.
Thames listened to Zoey saying something for a moment, before turning back to Alia.
“So, seems our mutual BFF wants me to… put you through some things on her behalf. Tell me… how’s your pain threshold?”
Alia stared at him, eyes wide.
He expects me to play along with this?
* * *
When Sam awoke from a nap that couldn’t have lasted more than twenty minutes, Tim was staring at the force field as though he was willing it to do something.
“Something happening?” he asked, rubbing his eyes as he sat up.
“Nope, nothing,” Tim said, sounding frantic. “Incommunicado.”
He turned towards Sam, a glint of desperation in his eye.
“Quinn, I’m scared.”
“What is this all of a sudden?” Sam asked, standing. Tim pulled at his hair with his fingers nervously.
“What if all this was tricks?” he said, grabbing Sam by the shoulders. “They can make you see things. Things you want to see.”
“You said you didn’t tell ’em about John. How would they know to do this?”
Tim’s grip tightened. “I didn’t, but what if Sherri did? They coulda been playing us for information.”
Sam raised his hands, returning the grip.
“Hey, it’s alright. Breathe.” He demonstrated, taking a deep breath. Tim hesitantly followed his order, and they exhaled in unison. “Okay, hopefully we’re feeling a little calmer, thinking more clearly. Now listen, why exactly would they trick us into thinking we have a chance of escape? You kept saying their strategy was to make us all give up hope, right?”
“They let Sherri escape, so–”
“So they could see what she was gonna do, you told me.” Sam gave a slow, circular gesture with his hand. “But they have no reason to wonder about that with us, right? We’re just loose ends they’re getting ready to cut.”
Tim thought for a moment, before relaxing his grip.
“Yeah… yeah, I guess you have a point. I dunno why they’d want us to think we can get out of here.” He met Sam’s eye. “Thanks, I feel better.”
Sam gazed into Tim’s eyes, searching.
It was a similar line of thought to what he’d just described, that led Sam to say what he said next.
“Tim, I’m gonna get us out of here, but you need to promise me you won’t tell the Kromaggs anything else. Not now, not ever. Because there are things you’ll need to know that they absolutely can’t know.”
Tim’s eyes were saucers as he nodded. “I… I’m gonna die if we stay here, and I’m gonna die if they catch me, so there’s no use sayin’ anything else. I promise.”
Sam, hoping his gut was not steering him wrong, broke eye contact, and stepped back from Tim.
“In that case…” he held out a hand. “Hi, I’m Sam. I… well, I’m Sherri’s uncle. Pleasure to meet you.”
Tim froze for a moment, before blinking, looking Sam up and down, and tentatively grasping his hand.
“When did you…”
Sam gave a firm shake. “Just a few hours ago.”
“How do you… just take a guy’s place and nobody even sees it happen?”
“Trade secret,” he said with a wink.
Sam let go of Tim’s hand, and it dropped to his side, as the bewildered man stood in silent contemplation.
“Listen,” Sam added, with his voice lowered, “I can’t see John either, but I have my own guy out tracking down Sherri right now. When he gets back, we can come up with a real plan.”
Tim’s pale face gave a weak nod. He was a man facing his last chance to do something right, and Sam believed he had it in him.
“Tim, listen to me. We’re going to make it out, we just have to stick together and trust each other. Got it?”
The shell-shocked look on Tim’s face finally resolved into determination.
“Got it.” A smile formed on his lips. “I won’t let Sherri down this time.”
“Guess you’d better pull off that leather jacket,” Thames said, gesturing with the revolver.
Are you really going through with this?
Alia gave him an intense look, before she shimmied the jacket down her shoulders, exposing her babydoll t-shirt. Immediately, the January night’s chill sent a shiver down her spine.
She looked out into the night, roughly where Thames had been glancing. “Wouldn’t you rather do this yourself?”
She let a mirthful smile creep onto her face as she added: “…Z-Dog?”
Thames sniggered, fiddling with the belt in his jeans. “You know in cartoons when someone gets so angry their face goes beet red and they start blowing steam out their ears? That’s Zoey right now. Ooh, she’s a salty cracker.”
He pulled the belt out, and eyed the buckle. “Feel like I’m a Daddy from the Reagan era.”
He leaned towards her with an impish look. “Or maybe just an average Friday night with the crew, am I right?” He straightened, giving the belt a test swing.
“Bend over, naughty girl. And lose the top, would you?”
A belt buckle, I can handle. But I’m sure this is nothing but a warm-up if Zoey gets her way.
As she pulled off her t-shirt, she clenched her jaw, waiting for the first strike.
Crack.
Alia kept her face blank as he whipped the belt against her exposed skin. She wasn’t going to give Zoey the satisfaction.
How much punishment does he expect me to take?
After several more lashings, he took her hair in his fist, and pulled her ear to his lips.
“Why aren’t you fighting back?” he whispered fiercely, before dramatically running his tongue up the side of her face, and throwing her back to the dusty ground.
Why didn’t you tell me that’s what you wanted me to do?
Slowly, she brought her cheek off the dirt, and glanced back at Thames with narrow eyes, trying to identify the breadcrumbs he’d left for her.
Crack.
He held the gun loosely in his left hand. Noticeably loosely.
Crack.
In his jeans pocket, something glinted in the moonlight – a cell phone was slightly poking out.
Crack.
Thames groaned, and began winding the belt around his hand. He was standing with one leg crossed over the other, foot on its side.
“Z-Dog, she’s not even reacting to this. What’s the point? She’s not a t-bone; we don’t need to tenderise the piggy before we spit-roast her.” He paused for a moment. “Wait, I messed up that metaphor, didn’t I?”
He’s giving me an opening.
Alia thrust her leg back, striking the ankle that was bearing all of his weight. He stumbled back and fell, allowing the gun to fly out of his hand.
“Ugh! Hey!” he moaned, flailing in a melodramatic display, as Alia scrambled to her feet, scooping up the gun in the process.
She trained it on him, noting the hint of a smile on his face that the near-full moon saw fit to illuminate. He raised his hands.
“Uh, you got me,” he said, rising slowly to his feet and letting out a nervous chuckle as his eyes looked towards Zoey. “Oopsie.”
Alia raised an eyebrow. “Give me that cell phone in your pocket there, and turn around.”
He followed her direction, facing away from her. “Okay, I’ll go quietly.”
Alia smirked. “Why don’t I make us even?”
“What do you m–”
She slammed the grip of the gun into the back of his head, and he fell to the ground.
“Just skipping the fuss, right?”
Alia dialled a number into the phone, and as she waited for a connection, she looked around into the emptiness.
“Hey, Zoey? Tell Lothos I said ‘hi,’ would you?”
“Hello?” came a voice on the phone. “Rembrandt? We’ve been looking every–”
“John, it’s me.”
“Alia? Are you okay? Why are you on Rembrandt’s cell?”
Alia sighed. “Why do you think?”
* * *
The creak of the window in the iron door caused Rembrandt to stir. He looked blearily upward at the face looking through the small opening.
Just leave me the hell alone.
The redhead woman known as Zoey was glaring at him, notably less smug than usual. He couldn’t tell whether that was a good or a bad sign.
“How’s your head?” she asked, her voice flat.
“What do you m–” he began to sit up, and noted that the back of his head was throbbing. “Ow… what the devil?”
“You can thank Alia for that.”
Every day since he’d found himself here in the ‘Holding Chamber,’ Zoey had been telling him all about the dastardly things this Thames guy had been getting up to while wearing his face. But since someone named Alia had come into the picture, she was almost all Zoey had talked about. The two of them must have had some history.
“How can she make my head hurt?” he asked, rubbing the sore spot, but it didn’t seem like there was any actual injury there.
Zoey smirked at him.
“Psycho-synergy, my dear.” She raised her eyebrows. “And here I thought you and your friends knew all about the leaping process.”
Psycho-huh? Only psycho round here is you.
Zoey’s face turned stormy. “Thames was sloppy. Alia got the better of him, and that pain in your head is a result of her beating.”
“Good for her,” Rembrandt said with a smile. “Hope she hurts him some more.”
“The marvellous thing about psycho-synergy, Mister Brown, is that it works both ways,” Zoey said smoothly, the corners of her mouth turning upward. “So you’d better hope that Thames gets himself out of this mess, or I’ll have you put on the rack and punish the both of you at once.”
With a grin, she shut the opening in the door, leaving Remy alone again. He leaned back against the cold wall.
Why am I always the one getting locked up and tortured? First the ’maggs, now this? Ain’t I got enough trauma by now?
* * *
“Hey, guards? I think there’s something wrong with this barrier!”
Sam stood before the force field that stood between him and freedom, as Al traced a finger through it, resulting in unusual-looking disruptions.
After a moment, a Kromagg soldier emerged from a corner, and looked, puzzled, at the electric ripples.
“If this is a standard electro-carbonic hybrid shield,” Sam said, hoping this grunt was not well-versed enough in the technology to see through his bluff, “then I think these patterns suggest a potentially catastrophic failure of the nobellium generator. If you don’t want a global short of the circuit breakers on this floor that may result in a radiation leak, I’d suggest you fix it. But that’s just the opinion of the guy who invented transdimensional wormholes on his own, so take it or leave it.”
As the soldier scurried away to find a superior, Al burst into laughter.
“What kinda nonsense was that, Sam?”
Sam grinned. “I’m sure it sounded… authoritative.”
Sam turned to Tim, who was hovering behind him.
“Get ready.”
* * *
“Wake up, you pathetic human.”
Sherri’s dazed feeling slowly subsided, and her eyes focused on Kasyr, as the pain of her beating made itself known to her again.
“Th-thanks,” she murmured. “I needed that nap.”
As she spoke, she spat out blood that had been pooling in her mouth. It was possible she’d also spat out a tooth, but she didn’t want to think about that.
“Sherri, I’m still here,” John whispered into her ear. “Hang on, I promise help is coming.”
She understood why he was being so vague. The mind-readers couldn’t get any details. Frankly, she didn’t know who could possibly be coming to help her. But, she trusted John more than anyone. She knew he wouldn’t lie to her.
“You know,” said the Kromagg woman, “a human eyeball is no different to a Kromagg eyeball. They taste the same. Or so I’ve heard.”
She stared intensely at Sherri’s eyes. “They’re a delicacy because they’re a status symbol. To have a stock of pickled eyes is to show your dominance. To serve them at a banquet is the height of opulence.”
She licked her lips. “I wonder what yours would go for on the black market?”
“That’s pretty gross, not gonna lie,” said Sherri, screwing up her face. “But if you take them, at least I won’t have to look at your ugly face, so that’s a silver lining.”
Kasyr smirked. “Then perhaps I’ll just take the one.”
She moved out of Sherri’s line of sight.
“Uh, Sherri…” John said, panic rising in his voice. “I don’t think she’s bluffing.”
“Can’t help but notice you’re the only Kromagg woman around here,” Sherri said, hoping to buy time.
“Yes, funny story, that.” She appeared back in Sherri’s field of view, holding up a wicked looking tool, with an obvious purpose. “Humans on our home world did something to us when they sent us away. Since then, every Kromagg who gives birth dies in the process, and usually the babies, too. But they are forced to carry babies to term, anyway, for the survival of the Dynasty. And they willingly do so.”
“They never forced you?”
“I don’t have the capacity to give birth,” she said, eyeing the tool, which had four arms coming off it, and a concave dish at the centre. “So I support my species in other ways.”
“Who can take a sunrise…” John’s voice warbled, as he jammed on the keytar.
Kasyr slammed her hand on Sherri’s forehead, forcing it still, and pulled her left eyelid open with her thumb.
“Sprinkle it in dew…”
Sherri winced as the tool was thrust towards her.
“Come on, look over here, you horrible witch!” John shouted, slamming a hand on the keys. “Ugh! I’m sorry, Sherri…”
“Keep singing!” Sherri cried, as the spider’s leg-like appendages entered her eye socket.
John bit his lip, and continued his song. “Cover it in chocolate and a miracle or two…”
Sherri drew a sharp breath.
“The candyman… the candyman can.”
With a horrible popping sound and a flood of intense pain, the deed was done.
In the Waiting Room, Quinn threw his double a bottle of iced tea, and sat back down beside him on the blue sofa.
“Let me see if I have this right: you find new tech on other Earths and register the patent back on your world?” Quinn leaned forward. “So you basically made a business out of stealing other people’s ideas for profit?”
Nexus Quinn gave him a hurt look through Sam’s face, as he cracked open the bottle.
“Well when you put it like that, it sounds downright unethical,” he said, rolling his eyes. “I merely engage in legitimate business dealings across dimensions. It’s capitalism.”
“I don’t disagree on that last point,” Quinn mused. “Thomas Edison would have loved you.”
“No doubt.”
“That wasn’t a compliment,” Quinn smirked. “So did you kiss my Wade before or after you started the affair with your Wade?”
Nexus Quinn gave a withering glare. “How many more ways to you plan to point out my character flaws?”
He took a swig of the tea.
“I’ve made a good, productive life for myself, and I live modestly. All round I’m happy with the way I’ve spent my time.”
“Except for the part where you were on Kromagg Death Row.”
“Except for that part. Yeah.”
Quinn brought a leg up over his knee. “I’ve been in a lot of situations that were just as dire, but I had friends to help me out of it. Why do you fly solo?”
Nexus Quinn leaned back, looking at the ceiling. He let out a breath.
“I don’t trust anyone else to make the right call. Too many variables to consider.” He frowned. “I don’t want to be worrying about anyone else getting into trouble in unknown environments.”
“You think having friends is a liability?” Quinn felt himself wondering what this Quinn’s life was like to bring him to such conclusions. “That’s a bleak worldview, man.”
Nexus Quinn met his eye, searching. “Who did you travel with, besides your brother?”
Oh, he doesn’t know, does he?
“Wade and Professor Arturo were the two I originally invited along…”
And then Remy got unlucky.
The double’s eyes widened. “Jeez, Old Man Windbag? Why him? He’d have slowed you down for sure.”
“The Professor was a great guy, saved our hides lots of times. What a shame you never gave him a chance.”
Nexus Quinn stiffened. “Was a great guy? So something happened to him? See, what’d I tell you?”
Quinn tore his gaze away from the smug face. “Actually, he was fine until the Kromaggs invaded my world. Sacrificed himself getting me here.”
It always comes back to you.
The younger Quinn shrunk away at this implication, and took a quiet drink as he digested the new information.
After a moment of thought, he turned to Quinn, biting his lip.
“I’m sorry. Guess I’ve been a reckless jerk.”
Quinn gave him a sad smile. “The two of us might be smart, but that doesn’t make us right all the time. We have blind spots, and it’s always helpful to have people there to point them out, so we don’t screw up.”
“So what do I do now?”
“You accept that this is out of your hands.”
Nexus Quinn screwed up his face. “That feels defeatist. Is there nothing I can do to help?”
At this point, there isn’t much, except…
“You could start by describing all you know about the ’maggs. Everything they told you, names of people in charge, what they already knew about sliding tech, any other info that might be useful. I can get you something to write on.”
“Okay, that’s better than sitting here biting my nails, I guess.”
As Quinn stood, he felt his cell phone vibrate in his pocket. He pulled it out, and saw an alarming text message from Colin.
“Oh my god. I gotta run.” He raised an eye to the ceiling. “Ziggy, could you take down any information he provides?”
With a sigh, Ziggy replied in the affirmative, as Quinn gave a distracted wave towards Nexus Quinn, and hightailed it out of the Waiting Room.
* * *
Thames looked groggily down the barrel of the Reality Lens, which John held as he looked back from the front seat of the SUV. In the driver’s seat was the buff Navy guy he understood to be Sam’s brother, Tom.
He shifted in his seat, as the chain of the cuffs on his wrists dug into the small of his back. His head was throbbing where Alia had clocked him one with his own gun.
“Fellas, I’m hungry. Can we stop at Burger King?” he said, with a flicker of fleeting hope that maybe they’d actually agree to the request. Next to him, he felt Alia’s eyes burning into him. She still held the gun on him, though the two of them knew it was hardly going to help if he did try to fight her or try to make a break for it.
“Who is this guy?” asked John, folding up the Lens. Before Alia could answer, Thames cut in.
“You can call me ‘Thames,’ though originally, that was just my screen name on AOL when I was fifteen. Well, the full screen name was ‘Thames6969,’ but I digress.” He threw a look to Alia, and she raised her eyebrows as if it was the first she’d heard of that. “Stuck when I moved in hacker circles and nobody gave their real names.”
He laughed. “Was about eight years before I found out that it’s not pronounced phonetically. Imagine my embarrassment.”
“We should’ve gagged him,” Tom said flatly, without shifting his gaze from the road.
Thames leaned over, getting a better view of John. “Hey, you’re a Sam, right? How would you like to help a guy wriggle out from under the thumb of a megalomaniacal computer? I bet you could earn some new boy scout patches.”
John narrowed his eyes.
“Why should any of us trust you?”
Thames glanced over at Alia, who was looking at him smugly.
“Aliaaaa,” he said, pouting, “tell them what I did for you! Zoey isn’t here right now.”
Alia let out a breath, and popped open the gun’s cylinder, displaying it to John.
“He did empty this thing and pretended it was loaded when I got a hold of it. He got captured on purpose.”
“Yeah, well,” John said, “that doesn’t mean this wasn’t some elaborate plan. I’ve read the reports about you guys.”
“See?” said Alia, gesturing to John. “There are limits to a Sam’s mercy.”
Thames squeezed his eyes shut, letting his shoulders slump. “Look, lemme make this easy for you. You figure out some way to help me escape, and in the meantime you can keep me locked up as tight as you damn well please. You just can’t let Zoey know.”
“And she could be anywhere,” Alia added with a frown.
“Then, in what sense is that making things easy?” John said, exasperated.
“You’re the brainiac, my dude.” He shrugged. “But you’d better work fast, ’cause if I’m in chains for too long, Zoey will be making sure the Cryin’ Man’s gonna have a few new tears in his ’fro, if you get the picture.”
“I literally hate this clown,” said Tom, scowling. Thames responded with a wiggle of his eyebrows. Unfortunately for Thames, Tom’s eyes were firmly on the road, and the reaction went unheeded.
John pursed his lips. “What’s she gonna do to him?”
Thames looked him in the eye, dropping his light and breezy attitude in favour of a grave stare. “What did the ’maggs do to Sherri?”
John went pale, and turned away.
Thames shifted forward, digging a knee into John’s seat.
“My Brother in Christ, I do not want that shit to happen to him either, okay? You know that pain is gonna leak through to me. So you being a bro and helping is a win-win.”
He leaned to one side, letting his head fall onto Alia’s shoulder.
“Alia, trash TV or not, these past few weeks have been… relaxing. I had so much time to think.” He peered up at her, giving his best puppy dog look. “You’ve been the Timmy to my Tabitha: healed my rotten heart and taught me the value of love and kindness.”
Alia pushed his head away. “Stop it. How can you expect anyone to take you seriously when you come out with things like that?”
He sighed, manoeuvring his body back to a seated position, and looked out the window, into the inky night.
After a moment of silence, his peripheral vision caught a new presence in the back seat, between him and Alia.
Damn, Zoey. Don’t you ever sleep?
He rolled his eyes, before turning to face the hologram, whose eyes were looking him up and down.
“So, how do you expect to get your hands on those crystals now?” she said tersely.
Thames snorted. “You tell me; you’re the all-seeing hologram.”
He felt the mood in the SUV tense up as they all realised who’d butted in. Alia fell back against her seat with a groan.
Zoey gave him the side-eye. “You might have exercised a little more discretion there, Thames.”
“What’s the damn point keeping it under wraps now?” Thames said flatly.
He nodded towards John. “He’s been a hologram.”
He nodded towards Alia. “And she’s been your leaper. Everybody knows you’re hanging round like a bad smell, Z-Dog.”
“Thames, I don’t think you realise how patient I’ve been with you all these weeks,” said Zoey. Her voice was tempered, but Thames could feel the burning anger oozing from her words. “While you were incognito, I allowed you enough slack to operate without drawing any undue attention, given the import of the mission. Now that you’ve been discovered, I’m under no such obligation. Particularly if you insist on announcing my presence to these fools.”
Thames rolled his head toward her. “You asked me a question. I answered.”
She leaned in close to him. “Consider yourself warned, Thames. Lothos is working on ways for you to complete your mission, but frankly he thinks you’ve been dragging your feet. Need I remind you of what happens when you fail?”
Thames’s gaze dropped as Zoey continued to stare at him.
“I know.”
“And I trust you’re going to stop calling me that demeaning nickname, aren’t you?”
“Yes, Zoey.”
“Good boy.”
Kasyr leaned towards Sherri, inspecting her vacant eye socket, before focusing her gaze on the remaining eye. She wore a look of vicious satisfaction as she appraised her work.
“All healed,” she announced, wiping a piece of gauze over the former wound to collect any remaining viscera. “Feel better now?”
Sherri scowled at the sadistic woman. “I hope you choke on it.”
“That has happened before.” Amusement played on Kasyr’s lips. “And it was entertaining for us all. Such weak men deserve their fate.”
She crossed to a sink and washed the gore from her hands, as John moved into her field of view, looking perhaps more disturbed than Sherri felt.
“Hey,” he said weakly. Sherri smiled at him.
“This isn’t your fault,” she murmured.
“I know you’re talking to someone,” Kasyr’s voice piped up from beyond where Sherri could see. “I keep feeling like someone’s behind me. Who are you communicating with and how?”
“The spirits of my ancestors,” Sherri said, narrowing her eye.
Kasyr’s face popped in front of her. “Don’t play dumb. You have some kind of communications device. Where is it?”
“Okay,” said Sherri, suppressing the urge to chuckle. “I’ll tell you, but you might need some specialised equipment to find it.”
“I swear, if this is another bluff, I–”
“You can find it lodged about twelve inches up my ass.” Sherri grinned as Kasyr let out a frustrated groan.
“Sherri, you shouldn’t provoke her like this,” John pleaded. “She’s gonna hurt you again.”
I know.
Kasyr stormed to her stash of tools, which Sherri couldn’t see, and the sounds of rummaging through metallic objects could be heard. John was watching her nervously, his eyes haunted as he was still evidently processing the eye removal.
Kasyr finally returned to Sherri’s front, with a curious smile.
“I can only assume that whatever device you’re using has a neural component. An implant, perhaps, that allows you to see what I can’t.” She tilted her head. “I could do a scan, but maybe some exploratory surgery would be a fun way to spend the afternoon.”
She slammed her hand on a button by Sherri’s slab, and it started rotating forward.
She looked at John with alarm, and he looked back a moment before frantically tapping at his handlink.
“Buy as much time as you can. I don’t mean to abandon you, Sherri, but like I said, help is coming and…” He gave her an intense look. “They might need me.”
Sherri forced a strained smile at him.
“Go,” she mouthed, and he gave a tense nod before blinking away. The slab continued to turn, leaving her hanging prone from the underside, about three feet from the floor. She felt a hand on her neck, brushing her hair aside.
“I’ll check your brain stem first,” she said casually. “Deary, I certainly hope my hand doesn’t slip and paralyse you. Or worse.”
“It’s not in my brain, you’re wasting your time!” Sherri cried.
“Well then you’d better tell me where it is, because my scalpel is hungry. I don’t think I can keep it away from your neck.”
Improvise. Tell her something believable.
She wished John could feed her some line of technobabble, but she was all alone.
“It’s all done remotely,” she said truthfully, “It’s targeted only to my specific configuration of brain waves. I’m merely used as a conduit. There’s no implants in me.”
She knew there must have been much more to how the technology worked, but she figured her vagueness was to her benefit anyway.
“Fascinating,” Kasyr said, before laughing. “There may be no implant now, but by the time I’m finished, perhaps there will be.”
“What?!”
Kasyr crouched, moving her face into Sherri’s view.
“That way we can record your brain waves, trace the signal, and find that friend you’re talking to.” She grinned, her pointed teeth bared. “John, was it? With a top hat?”
I’ve given too much away. I really screwed up.
Kasyr stood, and Sherri felt the woman’s hand caressing her neck. Then, the sound of buzzing, and cold metal on her head. Sherri’s heart jumped, until she realised Kasyr was shaving her hair off.
She watched clumps of hair flop onto the floor around her, and tried to control her nerves.
I see matted brown hair. I taste blood. I hear the hum of hair clippers. I smell my own sweat. I feel the cold, vibrating clippers shearing over my scalp against my will.
It occurred to her that her usual CBT tricks to calm herself were not particularly effective when she was in mortal danger.
Next came the cold, wet sensation of an antiseptic solution being rubbed onto her head.
This is it, she’s gonna start cutting next.
Then everything went black.
It took a moment for Sherri to realise the darkness was actually the lights in the room cutting out, but as Kasyr let out an exasperated grunt, her hope began to return.
Kasyr fumbled her way to the light switch, and tested it a couple of times before thumping a fist against the wall, and opening the door to the similarly dark corridor. Sherri did not see any of this, but pieced it together based on what she heard.
As Kasyr stepped out of the room, Sherri heard a series of thuds. As she hung, head still secured in place, she heard footsteps shuffle into the room, and then John’s voice could be heard.
“Oh, thank god she didn’t make any incisions yet,” he said, flattening himself on the floor and looking up at her with a broad smile. “Told you they were coming.”
“Who?”
A loud crash came from behind her, and the electrical haze throughout the room that Sherri hadn’t even realised she had been enduring came to an abrupt and merciful end.
“What was that?” Sherri asked.
“That was the machine that was messing with your aura,” came a voice that wasn’t John. “Wasn’t a nice feeling, huh?”
Sherri’s suspicions of the voice belonging to Nexus Quinn seemed confirmed when he peeked under the slab and smiled at her.
Sherri looked down at John, who was still lying on the floor.
“How’d you get him to help?”
Across the room, another sound came; that of a series of levers being pulled.
“Brace yourself,” said Quinn, as the shackles around her arms, legs, torso, and head, all began to release, and she dropped to the floor on her face, which intersected with John’s holographic face.
“Ow,” she said, climbing to all fours and rubbing her nose. She crawled out from under the slab, and paused as she saw Quinn and Tim standing before her.
“I never expected to see you guys again,” she said, with one wide eye. “How did you even find me?”
John climbed to his feet, and clasped his hands together as his eyes moved between Sherri and Quinn. “Oh, I can’t wait to see what happens.”
See what?
Quinn extended a hand. She took it, and a strange sensation passed over her. Sherri blinked a few times as the face of Quinn transformed into another very familiar face, pulling her to her feet.
“John?!”
“What?” he laughed. “No, no. It’s me! Uncle Sam!”
Sherri found herself speechless.
How did Uncle Sam get here?
“Awesome, right?” John said, grinning ear to ear.
Sherri’s shock turned to elation as she threw her arms around her Uncle.
“You have a lot of explaining to do,” was all she could think to say.
“You’re not wrong,” he agreed, “but right now we need to move.”
He hesitated a moment, regarding her empty eye socket. “I’m… I’m sorry we didn’t get here before they did that.”
Sherri shook her head. “Forget it, let’s go.”
Tim stepped forward, and held out one of the Kromagg blasters.
“Here, you’re the best shot around, right?”
Sherri accepted the weapon, frowning. “Well, that remains to be seen, now.”
Sam, hurried to the doorway, before pausing, and looking pointedly at a surprised John. “Thanks for pointing us in the right direction.”
“You can see John?” Sherri’s jaw dropped as Sam gave her a nod.
“Only since I took your hand, but yes. Now let’s go already!”
Sherri grasped the gun, stepped into the corridor where Kasyr’s moaning, semi-conscious form lay. With a swift, decisive shot, she blasted a hole through the commander’s head.
“How’s that for exploratory surgery, you sadistic bitch?”
Alia hugged her knees as she sat against the wall in this small, bare room in the Holbrook Systems warehouse. On the opposite wall, Thames sat, shackled and staring back at her with a resigned expression.
“This room isn’t very stimulating to the senses,” he said, his eyelids drifting down. “I might die of boredom.”
Alia glared at him silently, her eyebrows slowly elevating, and he finally caught on to her signal.
“She isn’t here,” he said. “For now.”
Alia let out a breath. “Thank you. We have to keep you in an otherwise empty room so she can’t be hiding somewhere and listening.”
Thames sighed heavily, letting his head fall against the wall. The two of them sat silently for a few minutes, as Alia’s mind raced with questions.
“So, I…” she hesitated, looking away from him.
“Go on,” Thames coaxed. “Time’s a-wasting. Spill.”
“Last time I saw you, you seemed to be enjoying coming after me,” she said. “What changed?”
Thames shifted positions, as he thought of his answer.
“Well, as I said, I was put under Z-Dog’s thumb ’cause she had–” he rolled his eyes, “–chronic pain, which made her ineffective as a leaper. Word was spreading about what happened to you, and it seemed like something was brewing. Pity for me, ’cause I’m stranded.”
He frowned. “I’m sure you’re aware that I’ve been here well over 48 hours.”
“The retrieval deadline,” Alia murmured. 48 hours was the maximum time window for a guaranteed retrieval by Lothos.
“A while back, I exceeded the deadline, and ended up not making it back. Instead I got stuck in a loop of leaping. So, when this job came up, requiring a potentially long-term infiltration, I was the one they directed here.
“Thing is, though, the longer I’ve been away from base, the more I could think for myself. So I started testing the limits.” He shifted positions again. “Like, what if I just pretend I’m a little more swiss cheesed than I am? What if I deliberately mess things up?”
“To what ends?” Alia asked.
His shoulders slumped. “Alia, there are things I know about Lothos that I don’t think you were ever told. About his plans.”
Alia leaned forward, eyes wide. “You know his end goal?”
Thames gave her a knowing look. “Yeah, but you might find yourself a bit enraged at the shitty reason behind it all.”
Alia glared. “Just tell me.”
But instead of continuing on, Thames’s gaze flicked to the right.
“Mugunghwa kkoci pieot seumnida,” he sang, a half smile on his face, triggering a memory in Alia.
Squid Game?
The little children’s song from the Korean version of Red Light, Green Light, sung in the TV series before the doll turned to catch people still moving.
He’s telling me to shut up, because Zoey’s here.
Meeting Thames’s eye, she gave the slightest hint of a nod. “Huh? What is that you’re singing?” she asked, playing dumb.
Thames shrugged. “Some children’s song.”
“Well, stop trying to get on my nerves.”
Red light, green light…
The train of thought sparked an idea, and she climbed to her feet.
“I’m going to the ladies room. Remember there are guards posted outside this door, so don’t try anything.”
She hurried out, and produced her cell phone, quickly tapping out a message as she covered the screen with her other hand, just in case Zoey had followed.
* * *
It had taken Colin three hours from receipt of the text, to completion of his small device, which was now in his pocket as he and Alia entered the room where Thames waited.
So, is Zoey here?
He felt like a ghost hunter, looking for signs of activity.
“Oh, hey Colin,” Thames said, Rembrandt’s voice making Colin shiver as he entered. He gave a quick look to Alia, with a faint twitch of his eyebrow, before returning his gaze to Colin. “My compliments on the workmanship on that Reality Lens. It was a bitch to sabotage.”
Colin threw him a sour look. “That’s enough, Thames6969,” he said, leaning against the wall.
Alia took her seat back on the floor, staring silently at Thames.
Colin crossed his arms. “That’s quite a screen name. Though I’m one to talk; mine’s 420FarmBoy.”
With curious amusement, he searched Thames’s eyes, as they widened.
“Oh shit, that was one of my internet besties when I was a teenager. Are you kidding me right now?!”
Colin shrugged casually. “Remember last year when we cracked those student loan records and wiped out millions in debt? That was a fun afternoon.”
He felt Alia’s eyes on him, and he glanced down at her. She was looking at him with surprise.
“What?”
“I didn’t know you were a hacker.”
He grinned. “You have to be to get around the government firewall downstairs.”
“You really did that? Isn’t it a crime?”
“The crime is the amount colleges charge for access to knowledge,” Colin countered. “And haven’t you committed lots of crimes?”
Alia went silent, mulling over his words, as Colin moved to Thames, and took a seat on the floor beside him.
Thames looked to a blank corner of the room.
“Zoey wants me to kick you in the head and see if you have a weapon I can use.” He laughed. “But I know you’re not that stupid.”
Colin looked at the space where Zoey presumably stood, and winked at her. “I am not.”
He turned his attention back to Thames.
Maybe if I bore Zoey, she’ll go away.
“So, apart from the whole Lothos thing, how’d things turn out for you?”
Thames stared at his hands. “Spent twelve years in prison for fraud, so it could have turned out better.”
Colin gave him a pat on the knee. “That sucks, man.”
“On the bright side, that’s twelve years I didn’t give a landlord any money.”
He glanced towards Zoey again, giving her a frustrated look. “I am chained to a wall. What do you expect me to accomplish? …Yes, I already told them that… Okay, fine, you do that. I’m not going anywhere, now am I?”
After a moment, he breathed a deep sigh. “Endora’s finally ridden her broomstick outta here.”
He rolled his head to Colin.
“You didn’t come here to reminisce, did you?”
Colin shook his head, and reached into his pocket. He produced a small car key fob, with a green lock and red unlock button.
“Think you can hide this from the wicked witch?”
Thames furrowed his brow. “Yeah, no sweat. But… I assume it’s not actually what it looks like, is it?”
“You gave me the idea: Red Light, Green Light,” Alia said. “You can use it to signal to us when Zoey is with you or not.”
“It’s connected to some binary LED switches I’ll be attaching to the security cameras around the warehouse. So if she’s with you, we’ll know for sure that she isn’t spying on one of us, and if she’s not with you, we’ll know we can talk to you freely.”
Thames gave Colin an impressed look.
“Nice job, Farm Boy.”
Colin felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end, hearing Rembrandt’s voice calling him that name. The nickname only existed as detached memories now, but hearing it in that voice felt like putting a tongue to a battery. He shook off the discomfort.
“So keep it well hidden, and make sure to use it whenever she comes and goes. Red if she’s with you, green if she’s not.”
He placed the fob in Thames’s shackled hand, and climbed to his feet, producing another component of his creation. He moved to the camera on the ceiling that was trained on Thames, and stuck the LED strip to the side. It blended in well with the existing lights on the camera in a way that wouldn’t be noticeable unless you knew what you were looking for.
He pressed a small switch at the side, powering it up, and the green light came on.
“When the light’s red, I’ll start putting up the rest outside.”
“So for anyone outside this room, green means ‘stop’ and red means ‘go?’” Thames asked, amused. “In what universe does that make sense?”
Colin chuckled. “At least one, I’ve heard.”
As Kasyr had been preparing Sherri for medically unnecessary surgery, John had centred on Sam, who was leading Tim through the corridors of the military base with a determined focus.
“Boy am I glad you’re here,” he gushed, as he walked beside them, unseen. “Sherri’s in big trouble. Please hurry.”
He glanced around, looking frantically for a force field he could use to make his presence known.
Dammit. Nothing.
Sam stopped at a hatch on the wall, and pulled it open.
“This should be the lighting for this floor,” he explained to Tim, as he inspected the wires. “We’ll need an element of surprise, so could you pull out these six wires when I give the signal?”
He ran a finger over the wires.
“Okay,” said Tim, voice wavering. He stepped to the panel, grasping the wires, and Sam strode down the hall towards the room where Sherri was being held.
As he walked, he started to slow, and put a hand on the wall.
John grimaced as he realised that the aura nullification was affecting him, too.
The aura of Quinn began to shift, as Sam clutched his head, and John began to see flickers of his own face.
“Sam… please keep going,” John pleaded. “She’s about to have her skull cut open.”
Sam looked back to Tim, who was gawking at the strange warping of his appearance, and gave a thumbs up. Tim, despite his obvious shock, went ahead and yanked out the wires, and the hall went dark.
“John,” Sam muttered, “I’ll get to her in time, I promise.”
Wow, almost like he was answering me.
He set his jaw, straightened, and marched into the nullification field, right as Kasyr opened the door. She watched the Quinn aura flicker away to reveal Sam, and her jaw dropped.
“Sorry ’bout this,” he said in a high-pitched voice, before slugging her in the face, and kneeing her in the stomach. As she keeled over, he landed an elbow on her back, which made her drop to the floor.
John returned to Sherri, inspecting her head: shaved, and slathered in a yellow antiseptic solution, but intact.
“Oh, thank god she didn’t make any incisions yet.”
He dropped to the floor to meet her eye. “Told you they were coming.”
Sam crossed to the aura disruption device, and slammed his foot into it, shutting it down, and restoring his aura to that of Quinn.
“What was that?”
“That was the machine that was messing with your aura,” Sam said, kneeling to get a look at Sherri. “Wasn’t a nice feeling, huh?”
“How’d you get him to help?” Sherri asked, and John grinned back as Tim began releasing her from the slab.
“Brace yourself,” Sam instructed, before Sherri flopped to the floor. For a brief moment, her face was inside John’s head, and he pulled away, laughing.
Sherri crawled out from under the slab, and knelt. “I never expected to see you guys again. How did you even find me?”
John looked at Sam, and then at Sherri.
I’ve never seen this phenomenon before. The shorting of the aura that will allow them to recognise one another.
“Oh, I can’t wait to see what happens.”
As Sam took her hand, he watched an electric crackle pass over the pair, and their forms wavered for a moment before resolving into their true shapes.
Fascinating.
After some reunions, Sam hurried to the door, before pausing, and looking John in the eye.
He sees me?
“Thanks for pointing us in the right direction.”
John wasn’t sure how to respond, as Sam explained to Sherri that the aura shorting had exposed John to him.
I’ll figure that one out later, he decided, and headed out into the corridor to witness Sherri ending her tormentor’s life.
“Boy, I’d hate to be one of these Kromaggs. Only one lady around, and she’s a psycho? No wonder they’re all angry.”
John’s heart skipped a beat as he turned to see Al standing in the middle of the corridor.
“Al…” John said, unable to suppress a smile. “I didn’t expect to be able to see you.”
Sherri whipped her head around to John, jaw slack. “You see Al?!”
“Don’t ask me, I’m as surprised as you,” he replied. “But welcome to the party. Let’s lead these three upstairs.”
“Upstairs?”
Tim scratched his head. “I think I’m missin’ some key parts of this,” he said in confusion.
“Yeah,” Sam cut in, “this isn’t just a rescue. We still have a job to finish, right?”
“Right,” agreed John, standing with his fellow hologram and eyeing his colourful handlink.
“Clear to the end of the hall up that-away,” Al said, pointing with his cigar. He glanced up at John. “Shall we?”
John nodded, and the pair tapped on their respective handlinks, centring themselves at the door at the end of the corridor. Al stuck his head through the door for a moment, before returning.
“Clear in there.”
Casually, he sucked on his cigar as John gawked at him, still processing everything that was happening.
“I see you leaned into the ‘Gay Willy Wonka’ business. Nice hat. Very… ah, dapper.”
John flushed. “How do you even know about that?”
Only my Al should be aware of that. Right?
Al smirked. “Hate to tell you, but everybody knows about that now.” He tapped the ash from his cigar. “You told us one helluva story.”
“I told you?” John’s mind raced.
“It only gets weirder,” Al said, and gestured as the three non-holograms approached. “Come on, the coast is clear.”
Sam reached for the door with his stolen keycard, but stiffened, hesitating a moment. “Are you sure?”
Al squinted at him a moment, before sticking his head into the door again. He emerged with wide eyes.
“Good instincts, Sam,” he said, bewildered. “Couple of goons coming up the stairs from below.”
John glanced at Sam, who looked almost as surprised.
“Instincts, huh?” Sherri said, eyeing Sam. “Well, come on, then.”
She looked at John. “Distraction?”
John smiled, and exchanged a look with Al. He leaned over, and grabbed for the keytar he’d put aside. As he made contact, it became visible to the others, and he slung it over is chest.
“Distraction.”
Sherri leaned toward him. “Can I make a request?”
John suppressed laughter as she whispered it into his ear.
“You just want to see me squirm, don’t you?” he said, heat rising in his face. “In front of Sam and Al? Really?”
Sherri nodded vigorously. “You wouldn’t say ‘no’ to a girl who just lost her depth perception, would you?”
Giving a resigned look, John adjusted his bow tie nervously, and stepped through the wall.
“What’re we doing?” asked a puzzled Al, as he followed John into the stairwell.
“Feel free to join in if you know this one,” said John, grinning as he started playing the keytar. He was certain his face was red as a tomato. “You go downstairs, I’ll go up, and we can split their attention.”
Al nodded, and tapped his handlink, blinking to a landing below, as the Kromaggs began ascending the staircase between the holograms. John followed suit with his free hand, popping to the top of the stairs that ascended from their floor. As the Kromaggs reached the landing, John began singing.
“Every night in my dreams, I see you, I feel you…”
He heard Al’s belly laugh from below. John snorted.
Yeah, laugh it up, Al.
“That is how I know you go on…”
The Kromaggs, who looked like some kind of maintenance crew, had been reaching for the door that would have brought them face-to-face with the escapees, but the song made them look back.
“Far across the distance, and spaces between us, you have come to show you go on.”
One Kromagg leaned against the banister, glancing towards Al, while the other tilted his head, looking up towards John.
As he launched into the chorus, the door burst open, and the two leapers launched towards each Kromagg.
“Near, far, wherever you are…”
Sherri kicked the Kromagg who was looking down the stairs, leaving him tumbling down, landing with a thud against the wall by Al’s feet. He was out cold.
“I believe that the heart does go on…”
Sam put the other guy into a headlock from behind, and spun him around to face Sherri as she aimed the blaster at him.
“Once more, you open the door…”
“You guys don’t look like soldiers,” she said, noting the tool belt and jumpsuit he wore. “Come to fix the lights?”
“And you’re here in my heart and…”
He looked visibly terrified as he glared at the old, apparently blind, lady who’d just sent his partner on a trip.
“We don’t have beef with these guys,” she said to Sam.
“My heart will go on and on.”
“But do they got beef with us?” asked Tim, eyes on the maintenance guy at the landing below.
John turned off the keytar. “Don’t forget what happened the last time you tried to reason with a guy,” he called out.
Sherri frowned, and stepped toward the petrified worker. “Listen, I’ve killed too many of you guys already. Will you just pretend you didn’t see us? Just pretend your buddy there tripped, and you gotta go get him patched up. You might not wanna see what awaits you in the hall on the other side of that door, if you catch my drift.”
The maintenance worker nodded. “O… okay. N-never saw you.”
“Sherri…” John warned, blinking to her side. “Maybe you should at least tie him up or something. We’ve been burned before, and not just by Kromaggs.”
He shot a look towards Tim, who was obliviously looking down the stairs, scratching his head.
Al appeared next to Sam. “Haven’t seen a one of these baboons keep their word.”
“Nor have I,” John agreed, and said to Sherri: “Al agrees with me.”
Sherri turned to Sam, who was looking intensely at the worker. “Do you agree with John?”
Sam was silent for a tense moment, before letting go of the Kromagg.
“Go,” he said.
Wow, maybe he and I don’t think as alike as I thought.
The worker hurried down the stairs, and tended to his partner, as a pensive-looking Sam turned toward the stairs leading up.
“He won’t tell,” he said, before hurrying upward.
“How do you know that?” John called up to him. Sam reached the upper landing, and glanced back with an oddly calm expression.
“I just… know.” He gestured to the next flight of stairs. “Come on, is this an escape or a coffee break? Move it!”
The LED lights on the security cameras shone red as a small group convened in the common room.
Quinn sat on the arm of a couch, head down, as John feverishly tapped out a message to Al to update him on the situation.
“How are the new memories coming along?” Maggie asked, as she sat beside him. He gave her an unreadable look.
“Ever seen Titanic?”
Maggie stared at him a moment. “Like, the ship?”
“The movie.”
Quinn stifled a laugh. “I’m extremely curious as to why that was your answer to Maggie’s question.”
John’s cheeks went red. “Uh, never mind about that. Have you come up with any ideas about our ‘friend’ upstairs?”
“Well,” Quinn said, rising from the couch and pacing, “When Sam leaped into Maggie, it seemed like entering the vortex triggered a leap, but it pulled their quantum photon forms in with it. If there hadn’t already been a version of Maggie in there, I think it would have spat us all out on the other side with the two of them separated. So if we just send him for a slide, maybe it’ll sort itself out.”
Maggie tilted her head. “Didn’t you give away the timer?”
Quinn laughed.
“You think I wouldn’t build a new sliding machine in all these years?” He winked. “We had to get back home eventually, when all this was done. It’s ready when we are.”
He turned back to John. “Think it’s worth a shot?”
“It’s a sound theory,” John said, squinting as he processed the information. “But, don’t forget that your standard wormhole ejected you into 1978, and you know how much of a pain it was to get you back to your time.”
Quinn bowed his head. “Yeah, that’d be less than ideal, and there could be further factors we haven’t taken into account.”
Maggie turned to John. “How do you target the time for Sherri?”
John laughed nervously. “With extremely complex calculations based on Sherri’s chrono-biological cell data. Higgins does most of the work, but the data comes from extensive scans, which we don’t have for Rembrandt or Thames.”
Quinn ran a hand through his hair. “And there’s that other element I know we all love to talk about, right?”
John sighed. “Yeah. But we can’t rely on whatever’s going on there. I mean, he took off with two of my best friends to who-knows-where. I don’t know what the guy’s thinking.”
Quinn flopped back onto the couch arm. “And I suppose Ziggy’s too busy to run models, right?”
John huffed. “If we don’t do something soon…”
“I know, man,” Quinn said.
In his periphery, Quinn sensed the lights on the cameras flick to green. The three of them clammed up for a moment, before John stood.
“Look, I’m going to head to Stallions Gate,” he said. “Need to see how everything’s coming along from their perspective, not just my unstable memories of the situation.”
Quinn nodded. “Let my counterpart know what’s going on too, would you? I bet he’s getting tense.”
“Sure,” John agreed. Maggie stood, and gave him a hug.
“See you round, Uncle Sam.”
“Why do you like Sam so much?” came Tom’s voice, who was now standing in the doorway. “My Maggie… Sherri… was so affectionate to Sam, then cold to me.”
John looked between them awkwardly. “Uh, I’m not qualified to participate in this conversation, so see you later…”
Tom stepped aside as John moved out of the door, turning back for a moment to place a hand on Tom’s shoulder.
“I still owe you some quality time,” he said, “but it’ll have to wait until this crisis simmers down, huh?”
Tom nodded. “Yeah. Call me later.”
They exchanged a smile, before John disappeared from view.
Quinn made himself scarce as Tom closed the door, and turned his attention back to Maggie. Maggie had returned to her seated position, looking up at him.
“My view of the situation was that you were affectionate to Uncle Sam, and cold to me,” she explained. “And you know Sam, right? He’s a lovable guy. Every version I’ve met, anyway; and that’s three so far.”
Tom considered her words as he crossed to the other couch, and took a seat.
“Yeah, that seems like a universal truth, right there,” he admitted. “What is it about him?”
“Why does everyone like Superman?” Quinn interjected, unable to help himself. “Because he always tries to do the right thing. Even saving a cat from a tree. Doesn’t matter who it is, he wants to help if he can. If they’ll let him. Just look at Alia.”
Tom looked at him with a smirk. “You’re comparing my little brother to Superman?”
Quinn shrugged. “You don’t agree?”
“Well… don’t tell him I said it, but I guess it’s not completely off-base, when you put it like that.”
“See, look at that,” said Maggie, “the way you undermined your compliment. I never got straightforward praise when I was a kid. You spoil your approval with criticism, every time.”
“I don’t want Sam getting a big ego…”
Maggie raised an eyebrow. “Sam? He’d just get embarrassed and come up with reasons why you’re wrong. Besides, there’s a stark difference between a brother and your own daughter.”
“Well, it’s too late now, isn’t it?” said Tom. “How old did you say she was?”
“Well in John’s time she’d be… 48, I think?” Maggie squinted, and looked up at Quinn. “Did I get that math right?”
Maggie’s birthday is October 27th, 1971. We met Sherri in early May of 1999, and then we went to late November of 1978. Her last leap was in early February of 1998. That’s effectively 19 years on top of Maggie’s age. But are we going by precise time spent alive, or number of birthdays experienced? Because it’ll be different.
After some mental calculations, he answered. “Assuming you have the same birthday, she’d be 46, if we’re basing it on her body’s age,” he said. “And today I think she’d be 51, and with an adjusted ‘birthday’ in August, she’ll be 52.”
Quinn carefully skirted around the admission that the possibility of her being alive in 2003 was still an ongoing question.
“Thank you, Quinn,” Maggie said. “You didn’t need to be that precise, but it was an impressive display.” Quinn sent a crooked grin back to her.
“Oh my god.” Tom put a hand to his cheek. “I’m 52.”
“Well then,” said Maggie, “maybe if you ever get a chance to see her again, you can treat her as an equal.”
Tom sat, shaking his head in disbelief. After a moment, he met Maggie’s eye. “It’s been nice to talk to you,” he said softly. Maggie nodded back.
“Yeah. Likewise.”
Tom stood, turning to Quinn. “How’s your guest doing? Have you gagged him yet?”
Quinn frowned as he thought about Remy. “No, but it may happen some time. I’m hearing he has quite the mouth on him.”
“You haven’t seen him?”
Quinn and Maggie exchanged looks.
“No…” he admitted.
While he’d dealt with all kinds of doubles who looked like him and his friends but were different, it was different this time, somehow. The fact he had been seeing Thames for weeks, every day, and it never twigged that it wasn’t Remy.
He felt guilty.
Tom nodded. “Have you figured out how to help him escape?”
Quinn’s eyes popped open, and he shot a look at the security cam. The light was green.
Maggie stood with a frantic speed, finger to her lips. “Can it, Pops. Green light.”
Tom’s jaw slackened. “Doesn’t green mean ‘go?’”
Quinn, grimacing, shook his head. “Not out here.”
“I see…” Tom, straightening up, traced his finger and thumb over his lips in a zipping motion. Quinn and Maggie exchanged a tense look.
* * *
Sam burst through the door of the Kromagg office, as Al scrambled behind him.
“Sam, slow down! I didn’t even check for guys in here!”
“I don’t see any guys,” Sam said as he moved to the desk and began rifling through the drawers. John blinked in next to him.
“I know this office,” he said. “Belongs to another commander. Don’t know his name, though.”
Sam nodded. “Kerrick, I think. Something like that.”
“Did Nexus Quinn tell you that?”
I don’t think Al told me, but maybe I’ve got some of Quinn’s mind.
“Yeah, I guess so.”
Sherri and Tim were just now arriving. Tim gave a look down the corridor while Sherri cast a bewildered look to Sam.
“Why did you just run ahead like that?” Sherri asked as she closed the door.
“Sorry,” he said. “The commander’ll be back soon, so we need to work fast.”
He reached into a drawer and felt around the base of the drawer above. His fingers landed on a tiny compartment, which he flipped open, and a key fell into his palm.
“Why do you keep talking like you know everything?” John asked, his brow heavy over his eyes. “This is creeping me out.”
Sam held up the key. “Because… apparently I do?”
Sam couldn’t explain it either. It was a strange, unearthly feeling that gave him butterflies, but not in a bad way. He’d first started to notice it as he and Tim had been planning their escape. It was as though he was witnessing an array of branching possibilities expanding before him, and he could identify the probabilities of each outcome.
There’s no reason I should feel as certain as I do. Is this how Ziggy feels all the time?
He handed the key to Sherri.
“The data crystal is in there,” he said, pointing to a painting on the wall.
“In the painting?” Tim asked.
“In the—?” Sam gave him an exasperated look. “No, behind it.”
He felt the eyes of both holograms on him as he sat down at the computer on the desk and began to stare at the Kromagg text.
“We need to find out what they’ve done with the data. Destroying the crystal might only be the first step if they’ve copied it.”
“Don’t tell me you can read Kromagg all of a sudden,” John said.
“No, but…” said Sam, squinting at it, “we know they speak English. This has got to be some kind of alphabet, right?”
“Yeah, I’d thought Phoenician, but some of the characters aren’t even close.” John leaned to look at the screen as Sam’s mind raced.
“There’s some characteristics of Aramaic as well, but you’re right. I think it’s a deliberate red herring. It could just be a substitution cipher.”
“Huh.” John turned to Al. “Wanna race to see if Ziggy or Higgins can figure this thing out first?”
Al looked at the two of them, baffled. “Uh, sure thing. But Ziggins might have the upper hand.”
Sam turned to Al. “Uh… did you just say ‘Ziggins?’”
“Tina came up with it. It’s one of them, what do you call it? Couple names. Like ‘Bennifer.’”
“What the heck is a Bennifer?” asked Sam and John in unison.
Al grinned. “Never mind that,” he said, as he pointed his handlink towards the screen, and it began to scan the text.
Sam flipped through as much text as he could as Al scanned, for ample sampling.
Meanwhile, he glanced up to Tim and Sherri, who had retrieved the crystal from a compartment in the wall. They were now looking at the painting.
“Hey, ain’t she…” said Tim. Sherri nodded.
“Only one ’magg she could be.”
John crossed to the picture, which was a Kromagg man and woman. “And he’s the guy whose office we’re in right now.”
“You don’t think they were…”
“Why else would there be a portrait of them?”
Sam had a feeling about this that he didn’t like.
We can’t be here when he gets back.
Sam’s knee bounced as he sat in the plush chair. “Al, how’s Ziggy doing?”
Al paused for a moment, before looking up from the handlink. “Got it.”
“Give me a projection of the key real quick.”
Al tapped a few buttons, and pointed the handlink at a vacant part of the desk, and the translation of the symbols appeared.
John approached, and the two of them memorised it together.
“Got it,” Sam said, and switched his attention to the computer, where everything suddenly made a lot more sense. He searched through local documents and records at as fast a pace as he could, before finding upload records for data that matched some of the key equations he recognised.
“The data’s been put on a remote server,” he said, pounding a fist on the desk. “It’s got layers of security…”
He bit his lip as he continued reading. “They’re building a prototype integrated into one of their Manta ships. It’s in a hangar on the top floor.”
Sherri frowned. “So even if we can destroy the prototype, they’ll still have the info? Shit.”
Think.
Sam moved his chair back, and planted his head in his hands.
You know there’s a way through this. Just think. You’ve come this far. It can’t be the end.
And he felt himself, again, seeing the world in a series of branching possibilities, like the great tree that cocooned him. He was floating outside of time, and it seemed as though every moment of his life was happening at once, like a bundled up string compressed into a tight ball. And right next to his own life, with moments of intertwined string, ran another Sam Beckett, one whose name was sometimes John. He saw a moment, there on that string, that sang out to him.
And then, he knew what to do next.
Sam leaped.
“I got tears in my ’fro, ’cause my world is upside down over you…”
The little hatch in the door swung open with a squeak, and Zoey’s unimpressed face appeared.
“Your endless caterwauling is giving me a headache, Mister Brown.”
Rembrandt perked up. “Oh, then I’d better keep on goin’.” He grinned, and continued his song.
“I should comb ’em out—”
“Oh, I shall enjoy inflicting pain on you.”
Rembrandt’s voice caught in his throat, as the heavy door to his cell swung open, revealing a pair of large men on either side of Zoey. He retreated against the wall at his back.
“Uh, listen, let’s not be hasty, alright? I’ll pipe down. No more dulcet tones, got it.”
Zoey’s uninterested expression remained unchanged.
“None of this is about you. All our intel says you’re nothing but a washed up singer who ended up where you did through dumb luck.”
“Hey now, that hurts,” Rembrandt said. “If you get to know me, maybe you’ll change your mind.”
“I doubt that very much.” Zoey nodded to the men, and they approached him. “You’re only useful insomuch as you provide a useful conduit to Thames, who appears to be trying to betray me.”
On one hand, good for him. On the other… ruh-roh.
One of the burly men held him down, while the other started placing cold metal objects onto his head, all connected by wires.
“Hey man, whatcha got there?” said Remy to the man, who ignored him entirely.
The man holding him down roughly jostled him towards the platform that served as his bed, and began placing round glowing devices around his wrists, ankles, and neck.
Zoey pulled out a device that reminded Rembrandt of the gizmo that the Professor was using back on Earth Prime, and she tapped on it. All at once, the objects around his neck and extremities were drawn to the platform like magnets, leaving him on his back.
Oh, I don’t like where this is going.
The second man continued applying the wired things to various parts of his body as Zoey watched through cold eyes.
“Oh boy…”
* * *
Sherri watched Sam, hunched over, deep in thought, her heart racing.
“Sam, what should we–”
A blue light encased him.
What… no…
John jumped back. “Sam?!”
When the light subsided, Nexus Quinn jumped in his seat, and looked wildly at Sherri and Tim.
“What…? Oh… oh no,” he said, as it dawned on him where he was. Then, he jumped to his feet. “Wait, did you guys finish your mission?”
Sherri closed her hanging jaw, as she looked at John, who’s hand was on his forehead as he tried to come to terms with what had just happened.
“Sam just… left us?” He had a lost look in his eyes.
Oh my god, how? Why?
“We didn’t finish anything,” said Sherri, slapping the desk. “We’re right in the middle of it!”
Quinn’s eyes darted around the room. “Wait, I’ve been here before. Is my timer in here? Did you find it?”
“Not yet,” Sherri lamented. “We got your data crystal, but it’s already been copied to a remote server.”
Quinn grabbed at his hair, pacing. “Shit shit shit!”
He paused as he looked at Sherri’s tense face. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry all this happened, Sherri.”
Tim tugged at Sherri’s sleeve, and she turned to him, lip quivering.
“Um… what just happened?”
“Quinn came back. I don’t know where Sam is now.” She looked towards John, whose shock had turned into a grave determination.
“It’s all up to us now, I guess,” he choked out.
Sherri shared a look with him, as they both steeled their gaze. “We need to get to that Manta ship.”
She turned to Tim. “If nothing else, we can set them back, right?”
Tim nodded. “I… yeah. I’m with you to the end this time, Sherri.”
Quinn put a shaky hand on her shoulder. “Yeah, me too. Should’ve listened to you the first time.”
Sherri hurried to the door, and swung it open.
Oh, crap.
The commander stood in the doorway, staring intensely at them and aiming his blaster at Sherri.
“I told Kasyr we should have just done away with you,” he said, voice low and dark. “It appears she should have listened.”
Sherri’s blaster was in her hand, but she knew that if she tried to aim it, he’d shoot.
“Hey, ugly!” came John’s voice from behind the Kromagg. It was enough to split his attention for a precious second, as she raised her weapon.
But it was not long enough for her to aim.
As she realised her error, and as Commander Kerrick pulled his trigger, Nexus Quinn stepped between them, and the particle beam hit him in the stomach.
Running on pure instinct, Sherri fired a shot past Quinn, into the commander’s head.
Almost simultaneously, the Kromagg and Quinn hit the floor, as wisps of red-tinged smoke rose from their respective wounds.
“Oh my god…” said Sherri as the events finally registered in her mind as having happened.
Quinn’s face was pained as he gazed up at her.
“It really is out of my hands now, I guess…” he croaked. “You’d better get going. Finish this.”
Sherri’s eye blurred with tears.
“I don’t know how I’m going to, but I’ll do as much as I can, Quinn. I promise.”
In the corridor, John stood with a look of hopelessness.
How… how could Sam leave us and let this happen?
“Oh no…”
Sherri absolutely did not expect to hear a voice from behind her in the office, and she furthermore did not expect that voice to belong to a complete stranger, but as she spun around, she was met with a man she’d never seen before, staring down at Quinn with his mouth hanging open.
“Who the hell are you?”
* * *
Several Minutes Earlier
(Relative to Nexus Quinn)
John tapped on his wristlink, and the Waiting Room door slid open. Nexus Quinn, who John saw as Sam, regarded him with surprise, before his mind caught up with his eyes.
“Oh right, you must be John,” he said, rising from the sofa. “Double of the guy in the mirror, right?”
He waved a finger over his face. John nodded.
“You got it,” he said, with an awkward smile. “Your double asked me to check in with you.”
“That’s thoughtful,” Quinn said, as John approached. “What you got for me?”
“Well, Sam’s managed to get Sherri out of the aura disruption field, so she can be retrieved when the mission is…”
He trailed off, as Quinn lurched back, eyes wide.
“You okay?” John asked. Quinn straightened, an amazed smile drawn across his face.
“I… I did it!” He let out a laugh, and clutched John’s arm with a tight grip. “I’ve never forced myself to leap at will before. But it worked. I can’t believe it.”
John squinted. “Uhh, Sam?”
Sam nodded, letting out a breath.
John stepped back as a new memory came to him.
He abandoned us?
“Uh, Ziggy?” Sam called up to the ceiling. “Honey, I’m home.”
“Yes, I see that,” replied Ziggy’s terse voice. “Quite a bit earlier than I had anticipated. Why?”
“She raises a good question,” John said, eyes narrow.
I have to believe he has a good reason for this, he told himself, but it was hard to accept as the recalled feelings of Sam’s departure washed over him.
Sam ran a hand through his hair. “I need you to activate the new code.”
Ziggy was silent for a moment.
“You were clear earlier that I must only activate it if retrieval fails.”
“Change of plans,” he said, looking at John. “It’s okay, I’ve got it all worked out. Do this last thing for me, Ziggy.”
“Very well.”
“Thank you.”
The door opened, and Al stepped into the Waiting Room, frantic.
“John, Sam just leaped out and I don’t know wh–”
“It’s okay, Al, I’m right here.” Sam stepped towards him, and swept him into a hug. Al looked at John through the embrace with confusion.
“We didn’t retrieve you, did we?!”
Sam let go of him, chuckling. “Nope, I came here all by myself. Isn’t that neat?”
He shifted his gaze between John and Al for a moment. “Guys, I have to get to the warehouse, right now. I… think Rembrandt needs me.”
John exchanged a look with Al. “Sam, Rembrandt is…”
“Thames.” Sam winked. “I know. Take me to him.”
* * *
Red light on.
Thames clicked the button as Zoey emerged from her doorway, wearing a broad smile on her face.
“Good morning, Thames.”
Hoo boy, this can’t be a good sign.
“Well. You either had a double dose of your extra strength painkillers, or you’re about to cut a bitch. Which is it?”
“Which do you think?”
Ah, shit.
She held up her handlink, and tapped on it a couple of times, before sliding her finger slowly up the centre from the base. Thames’s body filled with a buzzing pain that slowly climbed in intensity as her finger rose against the handlink.
“Uh, you plan on telling me what I did?” Thames said, through clenched teeth, as his muscles tensed.
Zoey loomed over him, her eyes burning with hurt.
“Thames, do you know what they’re going to do to me when my second charge is found to be another traitor?”
She turned the pain up a little more, and he felt himself shaking as the fire raged in his veins.
“I’ve nothing left to lose. Either you start obeying me, or I might as well end you right here.” She leaned over him, casting her face in shadow. “But not before you suffer a great deal, of course.”
“I don’t know what… you’re talking about…” Thames spat out.
Zoey rolled her eyes, turning away from him and gesturing casually towards the camera.
“Your little signalling system had a design flaw: that of user error.”
Goddammit. Why the hell’d I trust these dorks to keep my secret?
“W-well…” he took a laboured breath, “it was worth a shot.”
Zoey lowered herself to the floor, with a wince. She moved her face close to his, turning down the pain.
“Listen to me,” she said in a low voice, eyes wide. “If you just pretend this indiscretion never happened, and continue your mission as instructed, we can both come out of this… intact.”
I’ve never seen her this desperate. I must have broken something in her.
“Gee, you make it sound so tempting. Almost makes me want to choose that instead of being tortured and killed. Almost.” He smirked at her, as her eyes twitched.
“Thames,” she continued, her voice losing her usually well-controlled temper, “don’t you dare fuck me over like this. What they’re going to do to me is a fate worse than death. Are you so swiss cheesed that you don’t know?”
Thames regarded her coolly. “Oh, I know.” He shot her a satisfied smile.
“But I guess Lothos taught me too well. I can’t seem to care.” He burst into laughter. “Torture me all you want, but it’ll never be enough, because I’m not the one you really want to hurt, am I? Must be tough seeing Alia every day and not even having her know you’re there. Unable to reach out and drive a knife into her. Seeing her hangin’ out and making friends while you can’t even walk without a handful of opiates.”
With gritted teeth, Zoey swiped a finger to the top of the handlink, and his body roared with searing pain. He could do nothing but scream.
And then the door opened.
The pain subsided, just a little, as Zoey stumbled back when she saw that two Sams had come in the door, with Alia close behind. And one of the Sams was looking her in the eye.
“Zoey, you look… even more angry than I remember,” he commented, before turning his attention to Thames. “I hear you’re a hacker. Want a job?”
“Uh… what?”
Sam crouched. “I’m offering you a chance to get out of here, but the only way this is gonna work is if you’re willing to do what’s right, no strings attached. Can you agree to that?”
He held a hand out. Thames looked back at him, screwing up his face.
“Dude, I’m like, in the middle of being tortured right now and you’re offering me a job?”
Sam glared at him like he was an idiot. “Just take my hand already.”
Thames glanced at Alia, who was looking on with wide eyes. She nodded to him.
Zoey let out a huff, and began raising the pain levels again.
Do what’s right, no strings attached?
He thought about Colin, and their time spent hacking for the greater good. He put himself in danger to help people he never knew back then; why not now?
As the roar and burning coursed through his body, he let go of the key fob, and reached his shackled hand to Sam.
“Okay, let’s do somethin’ good,” he laughed, and he landed his hand on Sam’s palm.
Together, they leaped, as Zoey screamed.
Wake up.
Huh?
We have work to do.
Where am I?
Come on, I’ll show you.
I can’t see anything.
Your eyes are closed.
I can’t open them.
It’s okay, I’ll do it.
Sam blinked, finding himself in the exact position he’d left the commander’s office: on the chair, hunched over, with his head in his palms. He turned his head to face the window, where he caught his reflection.
It really worked…
Well, that’s my reflection, but what the hell are you doing here?
I leaped into you, but not in the usual way. We’re both here at the same time.
That’s wild. And where is ‘here?’
Give me a minute.
Sam stood from his seat, and began to properly see his environment. Then he realised that Sherri and Tim were standing over Nexus Quinn, and John stood in the corridor beyond, face pale as a sheet.
He moved in for a closer look, his jaw dropping.
I anticipated so much; how did I miss this?
“Oh no…”
He saw Sherri stiffen as he spoke, and she whipped her head around toward him, alarmed.
“Who the hell are you?”
Sam lowered himself to Quinn, eyes on his wound.
“Hey, let me take a look at this,” he said, gently pulling up Quinn’s shirt. Quinn, brow drenched with sweat, looked at him in confusion.
“Hey, I said who are you?” Sherri demanded, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him toward her.
In a blue spark, Sam was revealed to her, and she froze, unable to comprehend what was happening.
“I’m sorry I let this happen…” he said, and continued looking at the wound.
“Sam…?” Quinn mumbled, his eyes squinting.
If he can see me, that might be a bad sign for his condition.
“Hang in there,” he said, tearing off part of Quinn’s shirt and pressing it against the wound.
He’s not going to make it.
“Forget about me,” said Quinn. “Those blaster shots are… radioactive. I’m a goner… even if the wound isn’t fatal.”
“Sam…” John murmured, “what’s… um… going on? Who’s the guy you’re in?”
Sam glanced up. “You don’t know him yet. But he’s gonna help me hack into that server.”
What server?
He looked back down to Quinn. “I’ll find some way to help you. Just keep pressure on your wound, okay?”
He looked to Tim. “Can you do that? Let me know if he takes a turn.”
Tim, who seemed to have entered a fugue state where he was barely reacting to all the crazy stuff happening, nodded silently, and replaced Sam’s hand on the cloth.
Sam jumped up and dashed to the computer as Sherri pulled the commander’s body into the room, and shut the door.
John wandered around Sam in a circle, with a curious expression.
Okay, so this is all written in a code I can decipher, but I need your specific knowhow to crack the remote server and delete the sliding data. We need to work together.
Sounds fun.
Just one question, though: um, how?
We need to psycho-synergise. Share our minds; blend our knowledge together.
I assume you can do that, then?
Uh… maybe? Follow my lead, okay?
Sam closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, thinking of all the times he’d taken characteristics from leapees throughout time, and how he’d leaped away with a tiny piece still inside him. That, deep inside himself, he wasn’t alone.
I’m not just Sam Beckett.
We are Sam Beckett, we’re Tom Stratton, Samantha Stormer, Al Calavicci, Magic Williams, Jimmy Lamotta, Maggie Beckett, Quinn Mallory, and many more.
We’re even Elvis Presley.
Wait, really? Don’t tell Rembrandt.
We’re Thames now, too.
We’re…
They opened their eyes, blinking a few times as the combined knowledge flooded in and mingled. Two lifetimes of experiences flowed together. Beautiful, happy times, and brutal, unimaginably bad times. Suffering, and pleasure, and conflicting ideals.
Did you really almost shoot JFK? Holy shit.
Yeah, but the important thing is I didn’t.
Only big wig I’ve nailed is a Senator.
So that was you.
Get it? Nailed? ’Cause of the six incher that stuck in his brain? Come on, it’s funny.
No, it isn’t.
Let’s agree that murder is probably wrong, okay?
“Whoa,” John said, smacking the side of his handlink. “What did you just do? Higgins picked up a really strange energy surge just now.”
Sam and Thames rubbed their eyes, and gave their head a shake to clear the rush of thoughts.
“Hoo-ey, that felt like jumping out of a plane,” they hooted, as a shiver flowed through their body. They cracked their knuckles, and began typing at the computer as they felt both Sherri’s and John’s eyes on them. “We’ll be done here in… seven minutes, eighteen seconds. Give or take.”
We should have a couple’s name.
Ziggins shouldn’t have all the fun.
Wow, that was all you, wasn’t it?
Does ‘Sames’ sound too pedestrian?
This isn’t productive.
What about ‘Theckett?’
Don’t make me regret this.
‘Becames?’
Uh, let’s put a pin in this for now.
* * *
The hologram in the Imaging Chamber flickered to life as Al stepped inside. The same room as where they’d left.
Okay, we’re back here. That’s a start.
Sitting at the computer, he spotted Sam typing feverishly, with John and Sherri behind him.
“Sam?” he said, approaching the group. “Ziggy thought we’d lost you for a minute there.”
“Yeah, having a second mind mixing with Sam’s whole cloth will do that,” he said casually, without looking up from the computer. “Don’t worry though, we’re not planning to assassinate any presidents this time.”
He paused, flashing Al a cheeky grin. “Well, never say never, I guess.”
Al, dumbfounded, looked to Sherri and John. “You two wanna fill me in here?”
John gave him a broad shrug. “I… I’m officially stumped.”
“Wibbly wobbly, timey wimey,” Sam mumbled. “We’ll explain in a minute, just need to crack this encryption.”
Wibbly what?
As he spoke, Sam’s eyes seemed to change at random between brown and green, and his speech wasn’t quite his usual cadence.
Al tapped on his handlink, trying to figure out if Ziggy knew any more than the rest of them. As her answer came, he scoffed.
“Wait… Ziggy… what do you mean he leaped into Thames? How would he even do something like that?” He glanced at John. “Any ideas?”
“Who or what is ‘Thames?’” John asked.
“We said we’ll explain,” Sam said, leaning in further to the screen and concentrating. “Oh, here we go.”
“What?” asked Sherri, leaning in to the computer.
“Quinn’s timer is inside the prototype ship,” he explained. “But security is tighter than a nun’s – oh my god, Thames, I will not let us finish that sentence.”
He gave a violent shake of his head, before looking up at Al. “He has a dirtier mind than you.”
His gaze returned to the monitor. “Anyway, the doors are operated remotely by security. They check your biometric data before letting you in.”
He glanced up. “We can hijack it, but we’d only be able to open the doors from here… looks like we’ll need to stay behind. It’s gonna be hairy for you out there without us, though.”
“Sam, what about the data?” Sherri prompted.
“Oh, we already took care of that,” he replied, as if it were an afterthought. “The data’s gone, and we even added a booby trap in there. If anyone attempts to access the files, they’ll unleash quite a nasty virus on the whole network.”
Sam cackled in a way Al had never seen before.
“We said seven minutes eighteen, right? Right on the money!” He clapped his hands as if he were high-fiving himself, before toning down his irreverence and looking to Sherri.
“Alright, Sherri. You and Tim had better get going. They’re on high alert now, so you’d better be careful.”
“Wait…”
Al turned around, seeing Tim sitting beside a wounded Quinn, who was painfully rising to a sitting position.
“Carry me over there. I’ll work the doors.”
“Quinn, you look like you’re about to pass out,” Sherri said, her voice pitching higher than usual.
“I… I can do this,” he said. “I’ve worked with the Kromagg… systems a little, I’ll be able to figure it out. You and your… uncle… should stick together.”
John, Al, and Sherri all looked at Sam, who was looking at Quinn through bleary eyes.
“Thank you.”
He glanced at Sherri. “Let’s pick him up.”
As he moved around the desk, past Al, he paused. “Stay with him, Al. He shouldn’t be alone when he goes.”
Sam’s eyes didn’t change at all in that moment.
Excruciating pain. Unbearable, uncontrollable, unrelenting. Searing, violent, fiery pain.
Rembrandt gasped as he sat up.
No more!
“Hey, Cryin’ Man…” Quinn’s voice cut through the panic, and Rembrandt finally came to realise that he was in his own bed back at the warehouse. Quinn was sitting in a chair he’d lugged out of the common room, and was smiling at him from his bedside, a look of unbridled relief on his face.
Rembrandt wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, and adjusted his position in the bed, his feet touching the tiled floor. His body wasn’t in the pain he’d been sure it was in before he’d awoken, but it wasn’t free of it, either. All of his muscles ached like he’d run a marathon, and his sense of balance was off. Every movement was difficult.
“You okay?” Quinn continued. “John’s just a holler away, if you need a doctor.”
“John…?”
Does he mean Sam?
“I guess he got here after…” Quinn hesitated. “How much do you remember about the past four weeks, man? Maggie says you should remember vague pieces from either side of the leap, or more if we can jog your memory. But I don’t know how it works for those guys.”
Leap…? Wait, that rings a bell.
“Well I definitely remember a whole lotta pain…” he said, rubbing his temple. “And some cold-ass British lady.”
Then, as he continued to recall, he found himself recalling actions and words spoken that he didn’t understand. Slicing open Quinn’s jeans to retrieve a Higgins crystal, only to throw it into the New Mexico desert. Eating tofu. Mailing a package. Being chained to a wall. Discussing hacking with Colin.
Mailing a package?
His eyes went wide. “Did I… build a bomb?”
Quinn grimaced. “No, that was Thames.”
‘Thames,’ I know that name. And not just because I once took a leak over the side of the Westminster Bridge when I was on tour with the Tops back in ’76.
“Four weeks, huh? This Thames guy was impersonating me all that time and you never…”
Quinn’s face dropped. “Sorry, Remy. I feel like an idiot. We all do.”
Rembrandt sighed. “He didn’t have to do much to blend in, did he? All I been doing round here is sitting around. I think the night it happened, I was feelin’ a little lost. Kinda useless.”
Quinn moved off the chair, and sat beside him on the bed, wrapping an arm over his shoulder.
“We should have noticed something was up,” he said.
“I shoulda said something.”
A light knock came on the door.
“Come on in, he’s awake!” called Quinn.
The door opened to reveal Sam – or John; Rembrandt wasn’t sure – looking at him nervously. Around his neck hung a stethoscope.
It’s check-up time, huh?
“Hey there,” he said with a warm smile, “you had us worried. How are you doing? Seemed like Zoey was putting you through the wringer there.”
Zoey, that was her name.
He crossed into the room, carrying a bag of medical supplies, and sat on the chair where Quinn had previously been sitting. As he prepared his equipment, Rembrandt recalled through Thames’s actions that John had shown up with a woman named Alia on New Years Eve.
Alia… yeah, she was the woman Zoey kept bringing up.
And he recalled some conversations Thames had had with her, about a dystopian future.
“John, right?” he said, as John wrapped a blood pressure cuff around his left arm.
“That’s me,” he confirmed. “Try to relax while we get your BP, okay?”
Quinn stood. “I’ll leave you to your check-up, Doc.” He gave Remy a final pat on the shoulder. “Everyone’s in the common room. Come see us when you’re up to it.”
As Quinn left, John fiddled with the blood pressure monitor settings. “Guess we haven’t properly met since 1978, have we?” he said, tapping buttons that responded with a terse ‘beep.’
Remy nodded. “Been a longer twenty years for you.”
The cuff pumped up, pressing uncomfortably against his aching bicep. Rembrandt winced.
“Are you in pain?” John asked, as he noticed the reaction.
Rembrandt gave a dismissive shrug. “It’s the kinda pain you get after a full body workout… dialled up to eleven.”
John nodded. “I see. I wasn’t sure of the nature of the pain you were in, but it seems like it might have been some sort of electrical pulse to your muscles, maybe.” As the cuff deflated, John pulled it away.
“Blood pressure’s a little high, but that could be stress from your ordeal. You remember anything about what they used to hurt you? It’s probably not something you want to remember, but it’ll help me determine what tests I might need to run.”
“I think they stuck things on me, attached to wires, I guess?” He shuddered. “Felt like I was back at the ’maggot re-education centre.”
“Where did they put ’em?”
“Arms, legs, chest…” he touched his temples. “Up here.”
John’s eyes widened. “How’s your psyche?”
Rembrandt raised an eyebrow. “As good as it can be for a guy who’s been locked up and tortured on two separate occasions.”
“Well, I’m glad that whatever they did doesn’t seem to have messed things around in your brain too badly. Leaping and high voltage shocks to the brain don’t pair well. You let me know if you have any unusual symptoms, okay? Hallucinations, illogical thinking, loss of identity…”
“If I feel like I’m tripping, come see you. Got it.”
John began to rummage through his bag, and pulled out a small hinged device. He took a hold of Rembrandt’s hand, and clipped it onto his index finger.
“I’ve arranged for Doctor Beeks to come see you, too,” he said, and chuckled. “She was so excited that I called, and I had to break it to her that I wasn’t calling about me.”
He glanced at the reading on the device. “O2’s looking good.”
Rembrandt tilted his head. “Why’s Beeks want to analyse you?”
John put away the gizmo, before smirking up at Remy. “I suspect it’s all the repressed trauma.”
Oh, yeah. That old chestnut.
* * *
As Nexus Quinn was being scooped up and carried, he gazed up at the man he’d identified as Sam, whose appearance seemed to shift every other second. One moment, he’d look like what he recalled from the mirrors in that place he met his double, and another moment he looked like another man, with darker skin and wild brown eyes. He wondered if anyone else was seeing what he was, or if he was just hallucinating from his impending death.
Sam was explaining something to Sherri about leaping into a quantum superposition, which Quinn figured would all be fascinating to him, if he could properly process what the guy was saying.
“Then we opened up the separation between our two minds so that we could combine our skills. You’re talking to the both of us at once, and if that’s freaking you out, then join the club.”
“But how are you leaping around at will?” Sherri demanded. “I’ve never heard of anything like this.”
“We’ll let you know once we figure that one out,” he said, as the two of them gingerly placed Quinn on the chair at the desk. “Using the Accelerator with Ziggins seems to have done something to Sam. We’re still working on it.”
He glanced up for a moment, before answering a question it didn’t seem like anybody asked. “Yeah yeah, fine, we admit it: ‘Ziggins’ is a good couple name. Tell Tina she broke Sam on that one. Still working on ours, and open to suggestions.”
Quinn leaned heavily on the arm of the seat, as the Kromagg letters on the computer moved in and out of focus.
My stomach doesn’t hurt. It’s fine. I’m fine.
Sam pointed at a box on the computer monitor. “We’ve already got the access codes lined up. All you have to do is press here and you’ll gain complete access to the hangar security system. From there you’ll see a live feed of the doors. All you need to do is approve us when we show up in…”
He paused for a moment. “We wanna say twelve minutes and forty seconds. Does that seem right? Yeah, that’s the most likely outcome.”
He leaned over Quinn, his eyes green and twinkling. “Are you absolutely sure you’ll be able to do this? We know you want to help, but…”
“Leave it to me,” Quinn said, trying to sound cool. Though, it sounded closer to a whimper. “I’ve hacked… lots of systems. Listen, just get going, okay?”
Sam unlatched a digital watch from his wrist, and tapped on the side buttons a few times. “The hijack might be shut down after a few minutes, so don’t activate it ’til this alarm sounds.”
He placed the watch on the desk, as it ticked down from 00:12:30.
“If there’s one thing I’m… practised at, it’s pressing a button when a timer hits zero.” Quinn chuckled, and winced as the muscle contraction in his stomach sent a wave of pain through his body.
“Quinn, we won’t forget this,” said Sam, patting his shoulder as he headed for the door. “Let’s go.”
Sherri, Tim, and Sam left the room, closing the door behind them. Quinn was left in silence to contemplate his final moments as the timer ticked down slowly.
I’m sorry, Stephanie. I was a dick. I’m sorry, Cory. I hope you grow up well. And Wade, you deserved better.
He felt sweat dripping down his face. “So this is death,” he mumbled into the empty room. “Kinda peaceful.”
“Even with that dead guy on the floor over there?”
Quinn turned his head in surprise. “Huh? Who said that?”
“You heard me? Oh… that ain’t a good sign.”
The voice was coming from his left, but he couldn’t see anybody there.
Just a hallucination. Part and parcel to dying, right? As long as I don’t see the white light ’til after I finish this task.
“Name’s Al. Sam wanted me to hang back and keep you company in this… uh, difficult time. I didn’t get the chance to meet you when you were in the Waiting Room.”
Oh.
“Well… nice to meet you…” he smiled bitterly. “Maybe you can keep me alert enough to make it the next ten minutes.”
“The most I can do is yell at you, but I’ll be sure to do that if I see you nodding off. It’s a promise.”
“You must… hate me, for all this. Don’t worry. I get it.” He took a long, gurgling breath.
“Nobody hates you, kid,” the voice insisted. “Certainly not now. Playing keepaway with the grim reaper so you can make sure my pals have a chance? That’s downright heroic.”
“You don’t have to… humour me.”
“It’s just the way I see it.”
Quinn found himself losing strength to sit up, and his position had, over the past several minutes, become more and more slumped. His arms dangled over the arm of the chair, and he could no longer see the time on the watch.
I’ll have to wait for the alarm. Need to conserve strength until then.
What if I rest my eyes…
“Uh-uh, don’t you dare!”
Quinn groaned as Al’s severe-toned words startled him from the dreamlike haze.
“Mallory! You don’t have permission to close those peepers, you hear me?”
“R-right…” muttered Quinn. “I’m awake…”
He forced his eyes to focus as he looked up at the computer monitor.
“How long now?”
“Real soon. Think you can make it?”
The voice had moved closer now. Quinn rolled his eyes to the source, and saw a man standing there, looking down at him. A grisled man holding a cigar and wearing a strangely shaped tie.
“I don’t know what I… expected, but… wow.”
Al smiled sadly at him. “What a shame the last mug you have to see is mine, huh?”
Quinn coughed, which flared his pain, and he took a moment to let it subside.
Pain means you’re still alive.
“Certainly the… weirdest-lookin’ guardian angel I ever saw,” Quinn joked, giving what he hoped was a smile, but he doubted the corners of his mouth had been able to rise far enough.
“Been called that more than once,” Al mused. “One time a kid called me Abraham Lincoln.”
He sucked on his cigar, looking down at the watch. “Showtime,” he said, right before the timer started to beep.
Quinn reached a quivering arm for the keyboard, and with a mighty effort, he activated the hijack. The screen switched to a camera feed. Immediately, a head bobbed into the camera’s view: the strange man that had been flickering in and out of Quinn’s perception of Sam. He looked into the camera, and waved.
“Damn, that was some impeccable timing,” Al commented.
Quinn took a deep breath, and pulled the keyboard closer, so he could see the keys better. With one weak hand, he tapped a command, and the door on the camera feed slid open. Sam and Tim could be seen hurrying in, and Sherri, as the old eyeless lady, paused as she lifted her head to the camera for just a moment, before heading in.
Bye, Sherri. Sorry.
“You did it, buddy,” said Al, crouching by the chair. “…Quinn?”
Quinn? Oh… so long, kid.
* * *
Quinn felt his heart jump, and he realised he was no longer slumped over a chair, but standing up.
Wha…? I must be dead, right?
In front of him was some kind of bar, behind which a man was pulling a beer. He seemed to be ignoring the glares of two men sitting on stools. One of the men was awfully familiar.
“Al?”
Both the man and the bartender looked towards him.
With a thud, another Kromagg soldier dropped to the ground as Tam rubbed their overused punchin’ fist, which was beginning to show signs of rawness.
I object to this name. ‘Tam’ is too close to Tim.
‘Tim and Tam’ sounds like an Australian comedy duo from the nineties that people look back on fondly but then when they watch an old routine in 2017, they realise it was actually mega racist.
…Well, got anything better?
No… but it’s also too close to Tom.
Oh for the… it’ll do for now.
They turned to Sherri. “Okay, we decided to be called ‘Tam,’ unless we can think of a less derivative name.”
Sherri looked at them with a puzzled glance – which seemed to describe all of her glances since they’d showed up.
“Does that mean I get to be Sam again?” John asked, as he followed Tam up the ramp to the Manta ship, which loomed large over the smaller ones around it, that would have been a third its size.
“No can do, Junior,” said Tam, giving a smug look to John. “Sam’s still right here.”
They tapped their temple. “You wanna address him directly, use his name.”
John narrowed his eyes at Tam as they cracked open a panel at the side of the ship and began rearranging cable configurations.
“I’ll take you up on that. Sam, who the heck is this Thames guy anyway? Where did he come from?”
Step aside for a second.
Ugh, please don’t mention all the murders.
Believe me when I tell you I don’t want to dig around in there.
Sam shut the panel on the ship and crouched to open another, before locking green eyes with John. “Thames is from the 2020s, and is a leaper who worked for some bad people. That’s the, uh, sanitised version. I’m keeping his worst instincts in check, so don’t worry.”
John pursed his lips. “That doesn’t sound encouraging.”
Sam raised his eyebrows, giving a broad gesture. “We’ve got this far with him. He can’t hide anything from me like this, much as I wish I could unsee some of the things in his mind.”
And yeah, I see what Lothos wants now.
Sucks, right?
Didn’t stop you wanting a piece until you realised you’d never return, hmm?
I’m not disagreeing.
Sam cast an eye to Sherri, who looked wholly relieved that she was seeing only Sam. “We need to get inside, Sherri. In about two minutes, the hangar’s gonna flood with soldiers.”
Sherri nodded, and grabbed the wrist of Tim, who was still silent and wide-eyed.
Back to work…
Tam continued their work disabling the ship’s locking mechanisms, as another part of their brain continued to work on the problem of what was happening to Sam.
Is this ship bio-mechanical? We recognise a hybrid system when we see it…
The outer door of the ship made a hissing sound, and popped open. As Sherri pulled it open, Tam looked up at her.
“You never mentioned these ships were partially made of living tissue,” they said curiously.
“Does it matter?” Sherri stepped inside, pulling Tim with her. As Tam followed, they shrugged.
“Not really, but it just gave us a little more to think about.” They pulled shut the door, and whispered: “Voices down.”
Ziggy has a piece of Sam inside her.
The inside of the ship was dimly lit, and all around them, a humming sound filled the air. The red walls seemed to pulsate, like they were breathing. John phased through the walls, and visibly shivered as he looked back at the fleshy surface.
This is gross.
Shush.
… But… yeah. It’s super gross.
Having come to a consensus on the ick factor, Tam frowned, sticking out their tongue. “Feels like we’re conducting a colonoscopy, in the role of the camera.”
“What next?” Sherri whispered, glancing first at John, then at Tam, with questioning eyes.
Tam squinted, as an array of possibilities raced through their mind.
Sam could trace John’s life string.
“This way,” they said, heading further into the ship.
“Listen… Tam…” Sherri said, tasting the name. “Not that I’m not impressed with how you’re handling all this…”
Tam paused, looked back at her with a crooked grin. “You’re worried that the thing that happened to you is gonna happen to us, right?”
Sherri gave him a sheepish nod.
“Don’t worry about that,” they said. “The code that Sam activated is specifically designed to circumvent the dominance trend.”
They looked behind Sherri, towards John. “You helped design it. Or, will. Anyway, this is not a permanent thing. When we leap next, we should separate into two forms again.”
“Should?” Sherri’s brow furrowed.
“Trust us, we’re a doctor.”
With that, Tam wrenched open a door to their right, and disarmed a soldier who had been waiting to ambush them.
“Not today, Satan,” they said, with a kick to the junk.
That was juvenile.
Fun, though.
Tam grabbed at the Kromagg’s collar, brandishing the blaster they had just acquired.
“Sherri, if you wouldn’t mind, there’s some rope in the storage compartment over there.” They nodded past the door, to the room in which the soldier had been hiding.
“My pleasure,” Sherri said, giving Tam the first proper smile she had permitted since they’d merged. They worked together to tie up the soldier, who snarled and gnashed, trying to sink his sharp teeth into someone’s arm.
“Down boy,” Tam said, chuckling. They looked up at John. “Better prepare a rabies shot if he breaks the skin.”
John tilted his head and regarded them through squinted eyes. “I… genuinely can’t tell when you’re joking.”
“Thames deals with everything by making jokes and referencing pop culture,” Tam said, pulling tightly on their final knot. “So assume we’re joking most of the time. Though that doesn’t necessarily mean the joke isn’t the outer layer of a truth bomb.”
They gestured to the tied-up Kromagg. “Like this li’l guy. If he’s the truth, the rope is the joke. Just unravel it a bit to see what’s inside.”
I’m kinda surprised how many jokes come out of Tam. I always thought you were a humourless guy.
I have a sense of humour, it’s just… I know when to be serious. Sometimes there is nothing to laugh about.
There’s always something to laugh about.
There’s usually something to laugh about.
“I think they’ll be trying to get into the ship in about thirty seconds,” Tam muttered. “This might sound disgusting, but the quickest route to the core of this thing is…”
They slapped a hand against the meaty wall, and it responded with a repulsive ripple. “…Through the flesh.”
Sherri and John’s faces screwed up with revulsion. Tim, standing in the doorway, seemed to finally realise just where he was in that moment.
“Are you serious?” he said, his jaw slack. “That is nasty.”
Tam retrieved an axe from the wall, and swung it hard into the warm flesh, and a congealed black liquid began to ebb out.
“Oh boy,” they said, as the foul smell filled their nostrils. “This is going to be messy.”
As Tam dove into the hot, moist innards of the hybrid ship, the answer to their problem came to them like a cattle prod to a nipple.
Sam has established some kind of transcendent connection between other Sams. He reached out to the one whose life has touched his own, and was able to see what was happening with Thames.
My string theory…
Ziggy has a piece of me in her. Maybe I’ve been able to tap into it, somehow? Since Ziggins?
You’ve been making all these calculations and having the kind of probability insights I’ve only ever seen in a computer.
Sam is a hybrid now, too.
The revelation did not make the experience of crawling through pulsing, oozing flesh any more pleasant.
As Tam thrust their way out of the viscera and tore their fingers through the ship’s skin, like an infant xenomorph bursting through a chest cavity, they gave a sheepish wave to Al, who was on the other side, watching them emerge. His cigar smoke drifted upward, leaving his alarmed eyes looking through the haze.
“Welcome back,” said Tam, climbing to their feet and giving Al a nod. “Be glad you can’t smell this.”
Tam wiped away the fluids from their eyes and mouth, spitting away the cursed flavours, and gazed around the cramped corridor they were now standing in.
Just a little further.
“Well I’m just glad I was on the clean end of the bed when Beth was giving birth,” Al said. “I’d love to blow a few chunks, but there’s a more pressing issue, Sam.”
“Sorry, but hold that thought,” Tam said, and reached a hand into the gaping wound in the wall, grasping the hand that awaited, and pulled Sherri out, followed by Tim, who was holding her other arm for dear life and screaming.
At this, Al was unable to hold back, and leaned over, retching.
What, he’s never seen this much blood and gore before?
He was a prisoner of war, you know.
Then what’s the problem?
Sherri took clumps of biological tissue that were stuck to her face, and threw them to the ground with a full body shiver.
“How many more of these walls are there?” she whined. “I once leaped into a guy living in a sewer and it wasn’t even this bad.”
“That’s all of them, we think,” Tam replied.
John blinked into the room, and his eyes popped open at the scene. “My god, I just stepped into a horror movie.”
But if we replace one of our arms with a chainsaw, it could become an action movie.
Tam threw an envious look at the unsoiled Willy Wonka coat wrapped around John’s slim frame. Then they found their eyes wandering a little too much.
Mm. He’s cute in that.
Could you not?
Oh come on, it’s like the rules of the universe that if you ever meet your doppelgänger, you have to sleep together. It’s in the Bible.
I’m not gay. I’m not attracted to myself. And it’s not in the Bible.
Aren’t you? And I submit that the Holy Trinity is a three-way.
Thames, would you stop dividing our attention with these tangents?
Tam shook their head, and turned to Al, who was still looking a bit green in the face. “Al. You said there was a pressing issue?”
“Yeah, I just watched a guy die, and that’s not even the shocking part.” Al looked up through the hair of his eyebrows with serious eyes. “Quinn leaped, Sam.”
???
Tam had no idea how to process this information.
“He… did what now?”
Al began gesturing. “He was there one minute, looking all… deceased – not like I could check his pulse, but he sure didn’t look like he was breathing – and then… blue light, poof, gone!”
Tam exchanged an astonished look with John, before relaying the message to Sherri.
“Well…” said Tam, after a moment, “That’s certainly a… development. But we don’t know what to make of it. Let’s put that one on the back-burner, because we’re running out of time here.”
Tam gestured to the group. “Keep on your toes.”
They crept, single file, down the warm, glistening pink passageway, dodging drips of some form of mucous.
“I don’t want to know what this tunnel is for,” Tim commented from the back of the line.
“I’m still trying to dig out gunk from my eye socket,” Sherri moaned.
“Don’t worry,” John said, “when you finish here, I’ll retrieve you, and you’ll leave all of this behind. Sound good?”
Sherri was silent as they continued trudging through the goop.
“What’s wrong?” John probed.
“I’m just gonna miss Uncle Sam. That’s all.”
I’ll miss you too.
Tam felt Sherri’s hand take theirs from behind.
“Sam… when you left before, I felt such a sense of loss. Even though I hadn’t seen you in twenty years, I…”
Isn’t this the same person who held you at gunpoint and chained you up?
How many people who you loved as family have you chained up or held at gunpoint?
Touché.
If you don’t mind, I need a moment.
Sam squeezed her hand. “Sherri, I promise you I’ll find some way to see you again after all this is over. All of you.”
He looked ahead at Al. “I don’t know how, but I will.”
“So you’re not coming home?” Al asked gravely.
“I’m trusting my gut on this one, Al,” he said with a smile. “This new… awareness… wouldn’t have happened if I wasn’t meant to keep going, even when the Project is gone. I don’t need Ziggy’s help now.”
That’s not strictly true, but I’m not going to get into the weeds on being connected to her through spacetime.
Al gave him a forlorn look. “Really gonna miss you, pal.”
Sam felt tears welling in his eyes. “Y-yeah. Look, save it for when we’re done. I uh… need to focus.”
We need to focus.
As they rounded a corner, Tam pulled open a four foot grate at the end of the tunnel, before crouching and turning around, finger at their lips, and handing the blaster to Sherri.
“Wait ’til we mention the Commander, count to ten, then drop down after us,” they whispered, before flinging themselves feet-first into the grate, their mucous-slathered shoes making contact with a Kromagg worker, who had been hunched over a large engine access panel.
The worker fell flat onto the hard, mercifully inorganic, floor, and Tam stepped off him, glancing casually at the handful of other workers who were staring at the fluid-covered man who’d just been deposited into the room through a slimy canal.
“Uh, hey fellas,” they said. “Listen, we recommend you flee for your lives, because we suspect this ship may explode within the next nine-ish minutes. Just a fair warning.”
The workers glanced among themselves for a moment, before one of them raised a blaster, aiming it at Tam. They raised their hands calmly, as John and Al blinked into the room on either side of them, watching them with curiosity.
“A guy falls out of your… mucous… ducts… and your first thought is ‘kill it?’ You guys are working on quantum probability translocation, aren’t you? Be smart about this. Don’t give us physicists a bad name.”
“How did you get in here?” barked the man with the gun.
Tam pointed at the grate. “Came through there.”
“You know what I meant!”
“You weren’t very specific. Did you mean in the military base, in the hangar, or in the ship?”
The Kromagg seemed to hesitate as he, too, tried to figure out what he meant.
“Actually, we’re here at the behest of Commander Kerrick. But we had to sneak in because he didn’t want anyone knowing he needed the help of a human.”
“I can tell you’re lying without having to read your mind. And why do you keep saying ‘we?’ Who else is–”
At that moment, Sherri plummeted out of the duct, landing in a crouched position as she held two blasters out at the workers.
Tam placed a hand to her back and ushered her forward, as Tim fell from the grate, landing much less gracefully.
“That answer your question?” asked Tam, as they looked up to the opening. “Wanna stick around and see how many more are gonna plop outta there?”
At that, the room cleared out, with the gun-toting worker bringing up the rear.
“Don’t forget to get out of the blast range,” Tam called to the fleeing Kromaggs. “And there’s a guy tied up in the storage closet; he might want to leave, too.”
Tam flashed a wide grin at Sherri, who seemed to be relaxing more around the dual leaper since seeing them show mercy for the second time.
“We agreed that murder is probably wrong,” they explained, before excitedly crossing the room to a small panel on the wall.
They popped it open, revealing Nexus Quinn’s timer, set into a panel, with wires protruding from its sides.
“They were so lazy they just adapted the existing timer,” laughed Tam.
Sherri eyed it with a furrowed brow. “There’s no time display on it.”
Tam nodded as they rummaged through one of the abandoned toolboxes in the room. “Yeah, seems the name ‘timer’ is antiquated for Nexus Quinn. He figured out how to use it at will. Meaning…”
Tam returned to the panel with a screwdriver, and began unfastening the timer from its place.
“We can use it to send Tim and Janet away,” said John, “while I retrieve Sherri.”
He stared a moment at Tam. “And you… I don’t know what you’re gonna do.”
“We’re gonna leap out of here, of course.”
John’s eyebrows met. “Of… course. The… both of you.”
Tam jimmied the screwdriver under the timer, leveraging it so it finally popped out of its recess. They inspected the wires, then flipped it and opened the back up.
“While we’re doing this,” they said, turning an eye to John, “would you walk Tim and Sherri through looping the power cells into the exhaust cores? We’re gonna go out with a fireworks show, just for funsies.”
“But that’ll only explode once the ship is powered up,” John said.
Tam nodded. “So we’ll power it up after you guys are out of here.”
“And you?”
“We’ll leap out before the kaboom. Don’t worry about it.”
Al, who had been quietly taking in the scene, finally piped up.
“How do you know that’s what’s gonna happen, Sam? Ziggy doesn’t even know.”
Tam looked at him with a sage calm. “We’re gonna make it out. And in the off chance we don’t… at least we saved a few people along the way.”
That’s the spirit.
No strings attached, right? Still, I can’t deny that my decision to join you was informed by a strong desire to stop being tortured.
Good enough.
As John assisted Sherri, and Sherri assisted Tim, Tam disconnected the external wires in the timer, and set the coordinates for Earth Prime.
Gotta admit it, Nexus Quinn did have an intellectual edge on the one we know. This timer is a thing of beauty. Pity it was about to bring ruin to the multiverse.
“Who’s ready to slide out of this dump?” they called out, and Sherri looked up.
“Just a sec, we’re almost done.”
John and Al were now standing back together, each looking at their handlinks with concerned expressions.
Tam sidled up to them. “Whatcha guys doing? Tweeting?”
Stop confusing them with future stuff.
Ignoring their puzzled faces, Tam crossed their arms, leaning to see the two devices, one of which looked a lot like a thick smart phone with a deep crack down the middle, and the other that looked like it could be a baby’s chew toy if it were made of silicone.
“Something’s interfering with Higgins,” John mumbled, in a low enough voice that Sherri couldn’t hear.
“And Ziggy,” added Al, slamming his hand on the side of the whining block as it flashed with red and yellow.
Interfering?
“What do you mean?” asked Tam, glancing at the readouts scanning past the displays.
We’ve never seen anything like that before.
Tam closed their eyes for a moment, as Sam accessed that new part of himself that allowed him to float above time. He listened, and searched. He traversed along his own lifetime, trying to understand.
And he felt a hand touch his shoulder; strong, and firm, but one that held some familiarity. And he was pushed away, back into his body, and combined back into Thames like two rivers meeting.
As Tam opened their eyes, one short message bounced around in their mind:
Trust me.
As Al watched Sam’s eyes flutter open, the hologram of the Kromagg engine room promptly fizzled out. His jaw dropped.
“Hey, what! Not now!”
The Imaging Chamber door slid open behind him, as he ran a hand over the top of his head. He spun around to see Gooshie nervously standing in the doorway, dripping with sweat.
“What happened?!” Al cried out, violently shaking his unresponsive handlink.
“We don’t know…” said Gooshie, gesturing out into the hall. “Ziggy isn’t talking, but she’s sure doing something. She’s turned off all her other major subroutines, and that includes the Imaging Chamber. She’s overclocked and running hot.”
I didn’t even get a chance to say goodbye.
Al headed for the door, and Gooshie stepped aside. Immediately as he stepped out of the door, Al felt a wave of heat meet him.
“It couldn’t be another security breach?” asked Al, but all Gooshie could do was shrug helplessly as they traversed the hall.
“Don’t go near the mainframe,” said Donna, who emerged from the end of the hall, similarly drenched. “The temperature in there is over a hundred and fifty degrees, and rising.”
With pink earrings blinking against her cheeks, Tina appeared behind Donna, makeup running down her face with her perspiration. For a moment, Al thought she looked like a melting birthday candle.
“Gooshie, baby,” she said, scampering to the programmer, “I think we need to get out of here before we end up like that meatloaf I burnt last week.”
I need to call John.
Al dashed off toward his office, and upon reaching it, found his phone was already ringing. The caller ID told him it was exactly the man he wanted to speak with.
“John!” he said as he picked up the phone, and was met with John exclaiming his own name at the same time.
“Al, I just had a memory–”
“–Of being booted out of your hologram?” Al finished.
“Yes! It happened to you too?”
“Yeah, pal. And it gets worse.”
“Is Ziggy going nuclear?”
“So it happened to Higgins too?”
“Uh-huh. But my memory of what happened next is totally blank! I can’t remember a thing between then and walking in that bar with Will.”
Cazzo.
“Listen,” Al said, mind racing. “I gotta evacuate this place. Ziggy might catch fire or even explode at this rate. I’ll meet you over at the warehouse.”
“Okay. Be careful. I have no clue what’s happening, but I’ll try and come up with some answers.”
* * *
Rembrandt, who was finally attempting to use his stiff legs, padded to his door, his jaw clenched as he forced the sore muscles to work against their will.
At least they are working.
As he opened the door into the hall, he was met with a flurry of activity. To his left, he saw John with his head down, pacing, the heel of his palm set against his forehead. Nearby stood Quinn, leaning against the wall, deep in thought. To his right, Sammy Jo was typing something on her Blackberry as she rubbed the back of her neck. Walking immediately past his door was Colin, who backtracked a few steps as he noticed Remy’s presence.
“Remy, you’re up!”
“Yeah, but…” Rembrandt smiled weakly. “What the devil have I walked into here?”
He gestured to the distracted people in the hall.
Colin grimaced. “Yeah, it’s an all-out crisis. But don’t worry about it. You get your rest, man. Let us handle it.”
Rembrandt frowned. “Nothing I can do, huh?”
What else is new?
Colin seemed to notice his reaction, and returned a look of concern.
“Hey, don’t take it the wrong way,” he said. “I just heard you needed rest. I don’t want you to hurt yourself or anything…”
“It’s true though, isn’t it?” Rembrandt said, shrugging. “No need for a washed-up singer unless there’s a need to beg for change, is there?”
Colin’s brow furrowed. “Who called you a washed-up singer?”
“Lots of people over the years.”
Colin paused a moment, thinking, before placing a hand on Rembrandt’s shoulder. “You wanna get a cup of coffee?”
“Don’t you have a crisis to handle?” said Rembrandt, nodding in the direction of Quinn.
Colin shrugged. “They’re currently in the process of figuring out if there’s even anything we can do about it, so I’m sure if they come to a consensus on that, they’ll come get me. Come on.”
Rembrandt hobbled out into the corridor, eliciting smiles and nods from the otherwise distracted people around him. Colin took his arm, and slung it over his shoulder.
“Need a little help?”
“Thanks.”
In the common room, Colin helped him to a couch, and he grunted in relief as he allowed himself to drop down onto it.
A moment later, Colin appeared with a couple of mugs and a pot of coffee, which he served on the coffee table.
“I used to drink so much of this stuff when I worked in the diner,” he said. “And when I got home I’d be coasting on a caffeine buzz all night while I worked on projects.”
He took a sip from his mug. “Well, that’s what my altered history says. Don’t remember if I even liked coffee in the original timeline.”
“So what is this?” asked Rembrandt. “Some kinda pep talk? You wanna tell me I’m not useless round here?”
“No, I just wanted to talk to you, man. But if you want a pep talk, I might need some time to come up with one.” He placed his mug on a coaster, and took a seat beside Remy. “So… are you doing okay?”
Rembrandt picked up the mug Colin had poured for him, and swirled it around thoughtfully.
“Maybe. Haven’t really allowed myself to think much about it.”
He sipped at the coffee.
This is my first cup of coffee in weeks.
“That’s the good stuff,” he said, feeling the warm fluid trickle down his throat. “I don’t know how the coffee you make in an automatic drip is so much better than Q-ball’s or Maggie’s.”
“Freshly ground makes a difference,” said Colin, chuckling. “And you at least need to keep the grounds airtight. Quinn doesn’t care about how his coffee tastes, and Maggie is just generally a disaster in the kitchen.”
Rembrandt watched Colin for a moment, who brought a foot up onto the couch, tucking it under his leg.
I don’t remember a thing about his original history, not even that my nickname for him was once “Farm Boy” – except that I’ve been told that by Q-ball. What will it be like for me if the ’maggs never invaded? Will I forget those months in the cell?
“Hey, Farm Boy.”
Colin almost choked on his coffee as he heard the name. His eyes darted to the amused Rembrandt.
“Sorry, just wanted to see your reaction.”
“Uh…” With a wipe of his hand, Colin cleared his chin of the coffee that had involuntarily come out of his mouth. “Sorry, it’s just Thames called me that, and it was really strange.”
“Right… your… hacker name?”
“You remember that?” Colin’s eyes widened.
“A little. I remember saying and doing things, but not what I was thinking while doing ’em, if that makes any sense.”
“Yeah, Maggie had a similar story.”
“Except Sam never sent no shrapnel bomb to a US Senator.” Rembrandt put his coffee down, and slumped against the back of the couch, head tilting back as he stared at the ceiling. “I can’t catch a break. Least you had that weird cosmic bartender to guide you. I got nothing.”
Colin didn’t answer for about a minute. Remy figured he must have stumped him.
But, when Colin did finally answer, it made Rembrandt laugh.
“I think we need to find that bartender and sit there ’til he gives you a break.”
“Ha, yeah…” he said, before realising Colin wasn’t laughing with him. He turned his head and saw Colin’s unsmiling expression. “You’re… serious?”
“John had a tracer on the temporal anomaly, so presumably we can recreate that,” said Colin, gesturing. “We know where it last showed up in this universe. We just have to wait for it to come back, right?”
He took a swig of coffee, and stood. “I bet he’ll have all kinds of answers, too. We just have to make sure we have the right equipment so we don’t get trapped like John was.”
He grinned. “I’ll go tell the others. Thanks for the idea.”
When John and Al vanished before Tam’s eyes, they felt far calmer than they should have. They should have been panicking; Sherri certainly was.
“John?” she paced. “What happened? He needs to retrieve me. Oh my god…”
“It wasn’t just John,” said Tam, with a frown. “Al’s gone, too.”
“This isn’t happening…” Sherri gripped Tam’s arm. “How could both of them just disappear like that?”
We don’t know, but…
Something’s happening. Something on a cosmic scale. I feel it.
“We don’t exactly know, Sherri. But we’re gonna need to adapt.” They bit their thumbnail, thinking for a moment, as Sherri inspected Nexus Quinn’s timer.
Who was that voice? And what did they mean, ‘trust me?’ Trust them with what?
Surely it couldn’t have been…
God? Oh, please. If there’s a god, he abandoned us aeons ago. I don’t care what you think about your bartender friend, he ain’t a deity.
“As ill-advised as it is for a leaper to jump into a wormhole, we think it may be necessary for you to go with Tim to Earth Prime,” Tam said.
Sherri pursed her lips. “What about you?”
We need to go with her.
Why?
Higgins’s leap equations may cause us to leap at random once our quantum photon forms leave the wormhole. We need to be holding hands when that happens, so we don’t end up lost in time and separated.
Well, sounds like another adventure is afoot.
Tam smiled at Sherri. “We’ll all slide together, okay?”
Sherri’s anxious face softened. “Yeah. Okay.”
As Tam started up the power cores, and the ship headed for critical overload, Sherri opened the wormhole, and gripped Tim’s hand.
Tam took her other hand, and the three of them slid away.
* * *
Outskirts of Albuquerque, NM
February 9, 2003
Quinn tightened a screw in his newly configured timer, biting his lip as his nerves began to get to him. Was he ready to do this?
“Two hours in and out, right?” Colin asked, giving him a serious look. “Please promise me if the ’maggs are still around, you’ll find a nice, quiet spot to hide and wait out the time.”
“Colin, relax,” said Quinn, exuding a level of confidence he wished he actually felt. “We’ll be okay.”
Maggie completed her weapons checks, and secured her handgun in the holster on her hip. “I really don’t like that our memories haven’t changed at all.”
“Exactly why there’s no way in hell I’m going with you,” Rembrandt said with a resolute shake of his head. “If I never see another ’maggot, it’ll be too damn soon.”
“Sure do wish we had Ziggy to tell us this stuff,” said Colin with a huff.
Quinn cringed as he thought about the depressing fate of the world’s most advanced computer. Ziggy had never regained function before the Project’s power was shut down three days prior. She had been effectively pronounced dead. It had been a terrible day, especially for Al, who had stayed alone in his home, unwilling to see his and his lost friend’s dream end in such a way.
And so, the only way to actually find out if Sam and Sherri had accomplished their mission was to return to Earth Prime and see if the invasion had still happened. And given the state of their memories, Quinn was not looking forward to seeing the probable results.
He and Maggie were tapped to go and check it out, while Colin continued to monitor the sensor that he’d set up with John at the remote roadhouse where he’d emerged into 2002; the sensor made to detect the temporal anomaly that would signal the return of Al’s Place.
And so, Quinn set the coordinates to Earth Prime, and opened a wormhole. He and Maggie jumped in, holding hands, and praying that Sherri and Sam had accomplished their goals.
* * *
Quinn tumbled to the pavement, wishing that he’d been able to get a hold of the updated timer code that he lost when Ziggy shut down, which would have made the ride much smoother.
Maggie landed on top of him, and immediately scrambled to her feet, hands reaching for her guns. But, as the two of them surveyed the Albuquerque street, they realised that there seemed to be no need for alarm.
It looks… normal?
“You’re seeing this, right?” Maggie said, as the denizens walked by, some having stopped to stare when they witnessed the wormhole opening. Quinn nodded as he climbed to his feet, and brushed off his shirt.
“Well, let’s call home,” he said, striding towards a payphone down the street.
“Y-yeah,” Maggie agreed, following behind closely.
Quinn fed the phone some quarters, and dialled the California number to his home.
“Hello?”
“Ma…” Quinn’s heart caught in his throat. She was okay.
“Quinn? Oh, hi sweetie. What’s up?”
That’s awfully flippant for speaking to a son who’s been missing, isn’t it?
“Uh… nothing, nothing. Just wanted to, um… check in on you. See how you are.” He gripped the phone cord nervously.
“Quinn, that’s sweet. I’m just fine. But you’re gonna see me in three hours, aren’t you? Sunday night family dinner, right? Don’t tell me you forgot what day of the week it is again. You need proper weekends, honey.”
What the hell? Did I enter the wrong coordinates?
“Uh, right. Must’ve lost track. Well, I’ll see you soon, okay?”
“Okay. I love you, Quinn.”
“Love you too, Ma. Bye…”
Feeling entirely off-kilter, Quinn grabbed the timer in his jacket pocket, and inspected the configuration.
Those are absolutely the right coordinates to Earth Prime. What the Hell?
Frantic, he dialled another number.
After a few rings, a booming, agitated voice answered. “What? If this is a blasted telemarketer, I–”
“Professor!”
He’s alive.
“Uh, Mister Mallory?” the voice had lost its irritable edge, and was more curious than anything. “What can I do for you?”
Quinn met Maggie’s eye through the glass of the phone booth. He tried to convey his panic to her, but she didn’t quite understand, cocking her head to one side.
“Professor, are you… did we…”
“Oh, do spit it out, would you? I haven’t got all day, not even for you.”
Quinn dragged a hand over his mouth. “Okay, okay, I’m having a weird day, so I guess I’ll start with this: is Project Long Jump still going?”
There was silence on the line.
“Profess–”
“How do you know about that?”
“So I have got the right coordinates…? That’s even more confusing. Listen, can we talk?”
Arturo was silent again for a moment, before continuing. “Where are you right now? This number you’re calling from… 505…?”
Quinn grimaced. “I’m in Albuquerque.”
“I beg your pardon! Albuquerque?” Arturo let out a breath. “Well then, you’d better just speak with me now, I suppose.”
“Thanks.” Quinn leaned against the phone booth wall, relaxing a little. The Professor was alive, and the project still existed. That meant, at the very least, that the 1978 visit had still occurred, which was consistent with John’s memories.
It was unlikely, Quinn figured, that Arturo would remember their last encounter, in the abandoned facility. After all, that version of him had almost certainly perished.
But where had this second version of Quinn come from? Who else had spawned an inexplicable double?
“Do you… remember the notes I left you back in ’78?”
“…Yes…” Arturo’s voice was trembling now. “So, that was you. I had wondered if that version of you had been… erased. I think I might have an inkling as to what occurred, now. But, I’m afraid you may not like it.”
“Oh, I bet I won’t.” Quinn gritted his teeth. “Go on, then. Lay it on me.”
“Just a moment, I need to switch to the bedroom line lest my wife overhear. Don’t hang up.”
A click, then a tone, and Quinn shifted on his feet, as he beckoned to Maggie. She squeezed into the booth with him, and he held the phone between them.
“The Professor remembers us,” he whispered, “but my Mom thought I was some other version of myself.”
“What?”
Quinn held up a finger as the Professor picked up his bedroom phone. “Are you there, Mister Mallory?”
“Yeah, still here. You, uh… have a wife?”
“Yes, but I’d rather not waste time speaking on that matter when we have a much more important thing to discuss, if you don’t mind.”
“Sorry. Go on.”
“As you predicted in your notes, a Mister Mallory and Ms Beckett returned to this world some months after Miss Welles and Mister Brown. But, as no invasion took place, they remained here to resume their lives as normal. I believe you to be a divergence that has branched away from this Earth due to a paradox.”
“Wait, so we’ve become our own doubles?!” Maggie asked, looking at Quinn with panic.
“Yes, it seems so, Ms Beckett.” agreed Arturo.
Quinn felt his life slipping away. “But… we worked so hard to get our lives back…”
Someone else got our happy ending…?
“What about Colin?”
“According to my records, John had been working towards empowering him to slide after you. But it seems both vanished at points in 1998 and haven’t been seen since.” Arturo’s voice broke. “I’m terribly sorry, Quinn. My son was also a casualty of these disappearances.”
“Did Sherri ever return?”
“No, nobody seems to know where anyone went; not even Higgins.”
“Wait, Higgins is still running?”
“That he is. From the activity logs, it seems he was in an unresponsive state for several months before finally resolving, with a hefty update to the timelines of known Kromagg-occupied worlds. The changes brought about in that mission must have been exceptionally far-reaching.”
“That must have been what happened to Ziggy…”
“Well, would that you were in San Francisco presently, Mister Mallory; we could discuss this all evening.”
“I do have one piece of good news for you, Professor,” said Quinn. “Both Colin and John are alive and safe. At least, the versions of them I know.”
“That’s marvellous to hear. Can I expect to hear from John?”
“Count on that some day, but I couldn’t tell you when. We’re working on finding your son and Al. Long story, but we’re on their trail.”
“Is there anything I can do to assist?”
Quinn thought for a moment. “Well, all I know is that they were last seen trapped in a temporal anomaly that was bouncing around in time. Higgins first detected it, but it’s been in and out of worlds. It may be under the control of this bartender that – uh, this sounds out-there, doesn’t it?”
“I stopped being surprised by strange phenomena a long time ago, Mister Mallory. I shall review the Higgins logs for this anomaly.”
“Please don’t try and check it out, okay? It already swallowed up three people as far as we know, and only spat one back out.”
“Why, then, do I suspect you intend to go after it?”
“Well, you got me there.”
As he chuckled, Quinn noticed that Maggie was staring at something outside of the phone booth. He followed her eye-line, and almost dropped the phone when he saw that a wormhole had opened up in the exact place the two of them had appeared minutes before.
“Uh, Professor, can I call you back?”
Out of the swirling blue vortex tumbled two filthy, exhausted people: people Quinn had never seen in his life, but given the sewn-up eyes of the old woman, he had a pretty good guess as to who they might be.
Donna’s House, San Antonio NM
August 8, 2003
John nervously tapped on the door of his double’s former residence, a little suspicious about the reason she’d given for inviting him here. She’d claimed she had boxes of Sam’s old clothes to pass on to him, but he knew the date. It was his birthday.
As Donna let him in, he gave a wry smile at the people who jumped out at him from all sides, yelling ‘surprise!’ A banner that read ‘Happy 50th Birthday’ was raised by Quinn and Colin.
He cocked an eyebrow at Donna.
“You realise it’s Sam’s fiftieth, right?” he whispered to her. “I’m only forty-five.”
“I know,” Donna said, with a shrug. “But when you get back to your Earth, you’ll legally be fifty. You don’t want to miss your chance at a party, do you?”
“If you insist,” said a resigned John, “fine, I’ll play along.”
He glanced around the living room at all the smiling faces who he’d gotten to know over the months, even with the Project long since shut down.
The last six months had been a strange change of pace. Everything had slowed down as they awaited the return of the anomaly. Nothing much to do but kick back and get to know everyone better.
And, as he scanned the crowd, he met eyes with Jack, Donna’s younger brother, who approached him with a smile. He was forty-three, husky build, and had short, messy brown hair. John had gone on a handful of dates with him over the past couple of months.
“Happy birthday!” he said, extending his arms.
“Thanks, Jack,” said John, as Jack gave him a peck on the cheek. John shied away from it, opting to give the man a brief hug instead.
The problem of this pairing, unfortunately, was that it was based on lies. He had been introduced to Jack as Sam’s previously undisclosed twin brother, and now had to uphold that lie as a foundation of his relationship. He knew it couldn’t last, and it made all their conversations feel like traversing a minefield. But could he really break it off at his own birthday party?
He wandered further into the room, and a waving hand caught his attention. He headed over to Al, who was standing by a window, his elbow resting on the sill as he let his cigar smoke billow out into the hot desert.
“Was this Donna’s compromise?” John asked, gesturing broadly towards the window.
“Yeah. If wind starts blowing the smoke back in, I have to switch to the other side of the house,” he said with a roll of his eyes. “How’s everything going with tracking— uh, never mind.”
John tilted his head at the sudden clamming up, as a pair of warm arms wrapped around him from behind.
“What you talking about?” asked Jack.
“Nothing much,” John said, and gave Al an awkward glance. Al simply shrugged back.
“We’ll talk later,” he said, before leaning out the window and sucking on the cigar.
John let himself enjoy Jack’s hug; he figured he could at least do that. He tilted his head back, giving Jack a smile.
He’s such a good guy. Under different circumstances…
“Hey, happy birthday, Uncle… John!”
John turned his head to see Maggie.
“Hey there,” he said, pulling out of Jack’s arms and initiating a hug with his surrogate niece. As their heads came close, he whispered: “Thanks for remembering to call me John in front of him.”
“Of course.”
As they ended the hug, Maggie gestured behind her, where Tom awaited. He hadn’t been around much, so John was pleased to see he’d come to visit. The two shook hands, but after a moment, Tom relented and drew him into a hug.
The party continued as a blur of familiar faces and attempted conversations that continued to be thwarted by Jack’s presence.
After a while, John noticed someone sit at the piano against the wall and begin to play a familiar tune that made his cheeks burn. He trotted to the piano, leaning over at Rembrandt.
“Just who told you to start playing that?” he asked, setting his wine glass on the top of the piano. Rembrandt grinned up at him.
“Al. He said you’d know why.” And then he started singing. “Every night in my dreams…”
John sent Al a look across the room. Al winked, giving an impish smile. John laughed, shaking his head. As the chorus approached, he relented, clearing his throat.
Well, my audience awaits. This one’s for you, Sherri.
“Near, far, wherever you are…”
* * *
After cutting the cake, John chewed thoughtfully on his slice, and Jack, alone on the patio, caught his eye. He beckoned, and John joined him on a bench.
“Having a good time?” Jack asked as he took his seat.
“Yeah, it’s been nice seeing everyone together,” he said, then frowned as he thought about the people he wished were here.
“There. Right there.” Jack pointed a finger to John’s face. “It’s that look you always get. You always go quiet.”
“Yeah, I guess I do,” John agreed.
For good reason. I can’t talk about these things with you.
“John,” Jack said, nervously rubbing his hands together, “is this working out? You and me?”
John looked at him in surprise. “Uh…”
Jack grimaced. “I don’t want to bring down your party, but it just doesn’t feel like you’re very into me.”
John smiled sadly. “You’re a great guy, Jack, any guy would be lucky to have you. But you’re right, I don’t think we’re gonna… go the distance.”
Jack’s shoulders slumped in relief. “I’m glad it wasn’t just me feeling that.”
“And I’m glad you said something,” said John. “I was trying to think of a way to bring this up, too.”
“This doesn’t mean we can’t be friends, right?”
“Right.”
For as long as I’m still around.
In John’s pocket, he felt his phone buzz twice in quick succession, followed by a long buzz: a sequence of vibrations he’d programmed into it for a very specific purpose.
Eyes widening, he jumped to his feet, and spun around, meeting the eyes of Colin, who was similarly startled.
Between them, they shared an unspoken moment.
John turned to Jack. “Listen… take care of Donna, will you? I gotta go. Right now.”
* * *
“Okay buddy, you had your fun. Now would you take us home already?”
Al leaned across the bar at the bartender that apparently shared his name, staring daggers. In response, the undaunted barkeep threw him another cigar. Al took it begrudgingly, and placed it in his breast pocket, with a glare.
“You know there’s a party at eight,” the bartender said. “You don’t want to wait for that? I’ll be serving complimentary buffalo wings.”
The bartender gazed up at the wall clock over the door, which indicated that it was seven-thirty. Al looked at it with trepidation, not sure if he could trust any kind of timepiece since he’d been stuck here. Through the window, he observed a twilit desert expanse.
“What kinda party?”
“Think someone’s having a fiftieth,” the bartender said. “The big half century.”
“Who?” Will chimed in. “And is that the whole reason you’ve kidnapped us?”
“Kidnapped?” The bartender looked genuinely hurt, as he flipped a rag over his shoulder. “I haven’t even come out from behind this bar. You came to me.”
“Oh for the love—” Al grumbled. “This guy’s useless to talk to, Will. We’re better off just ignoring him.”
The bartender leaned towards him. “Our first guest is about to arrive. Excuse me.”
He moved to his beer taps, and started pouring one.
“Al?”
Al’s head whipped towards the door, where a man was now standing.
Wait, isn’t that Quinn something?
“Hey there, son. Thirsty?” The bartender placed the beer at the bar, where Quinn approached, looking lost.
“I thought the afterlife would look a little less run down,” Quinn said, glancing around, before fixing his gaze on Al. “Don’t tell me you really are a guardian angel.”
Al squinted. “I have no idea what you’re talkin’ about, kid. Where’d you come from just now?”
Quinn sat on a stool, grasping his beer. “I’m about ninety-nine percent certain I just died and appeared here like it was the pearly gates, so that’s how my week’s going.”
He took a sip of the beer. “Is this…? I dunno, it’s certainly not nice enough to be Heaven. Purgatory, maybe? Limbo?”
“It’s just a bar,” said the bartender, giving a shrug. “Though I like to think of it as a refuge for weary travellers.”
“I’m gonna go with Purgatory,” Al cut in. “Definitely Purgatory.”
He turned to Will. “What do you think, pal? Are we dead too?”
“Gentlemen, nobody’s dead.” The bartender turned to Quinn with a wink. “Not yet.”
Al reached a hand into his pocket to pull out the cigar, and felt a strange moment of confusion sweep over him. He looked up, and Quinn was gone, the beer glass empty on the bar. Puzzled, he glanced at the clock. It was eight.
Uh… where did that half hour go?
He slapped a hand on the bar. “What just happened?”
The bartender, now emerging from the kitchen doors with a large plate of chicken wings, looked at him with an innocent expression.
“What do you mean?” he skirted around the bar and headed for a table, where he set down the plate. “Help yourself, by the way.”
“Where’d Quinn go?”
He shot a look to Will, who frowned.
“Did we black out?” he asked.
“Oh, you mean the young man who was in here before?” the bartender asked, rubbing his chin. “He went to see his family, I think. Shame, really. He’s missing out.”
The bartender grabbed one of the wings, and took a bite. Outside, Al heard a few vehicles pulling up.
“Ah, right on time!” said the bartender, scurrying back behind the bar.
The first person to enter Al’s Place was a man Al recognised as Colin. He cautiously poked a head around the door, and held up a spyglass in front of his eye as he gazed around, like a sailor in a crow’s nest looking for land. As his eye line reached the bartender, he froze, and pulled it away from his face, wide-eyed.
The bartender held a finger to his lips, and winked. “You want some buffalo wings?”
The bartender licked his fingers as Colin cautiously approached the bar. He gestured to the table where the platter of wings awaited.
“Go on. They’re complimentary.”
Colin, to the bartender’s dismay, was uninterested in the catering. Instead, he took a seat at the bar, and stared intently at the bartender, silent and questioning.
“It’s been a while since you last paid me a visit,” he offered. “How’d things work out for you?”
“You’re…” Colin trailed off, turning the Reality Lens over in his hands. Al the Bartender gave him a serious look.
“Let’s keep that between the two of us for now, if you don’t mind.”
With that, he raised his eyes to greet John and Quinn, who were now coming in the door with greatly concerned looks. John’s eyes immediately locked onto Will and Al Prime, and he dashed towards them.
“Guys… oh my god. I’m so glad you’re okay.”
Al looked his friend up and down, then gave a flick to John’s unruly hair. “You, uh, didn’t have hair this long two hours ago.”
“Yeah, it’s been more than eight months since I left here,” he said, drawing his friend into a hug. “It’s safe to say a lot has happened. I’m glad he hasn’t kept you here for that long.”
Will gave John a look of sincere relief. “We thought you might be gone forever.”
John put a gentle hand on Will’s shoulder.
“Seems this guy—” he gestured to the bartender, “—had somewhere for me to be. I don’t think he’s done any of this without… some kinda purpose.”
“Is that Quinn?” Al said, pointing a finger. “Coulda sworn he was just in here, but he wasn’t wearing that getup.”
“Another Quinn?” John asked, eyes wide.
“Yeah. He was convinced he’d just kicked the bucket. Had us questioning whether we were dead, too. Funny thing, he seemed to know me.”
“I see…” John scratched his head. “He might have been right about his… status… but where is he now?”
Al shrugged broadly. “Don’t know. Blinked and he was gone. Seems we lost a half hour in the process.”
John turned an eye to the bartender. “Was it Nexus Quinn? Did you bring him here when he—”
The bartender quirked a smile. “Sorry, I didn’t catch his name. Happy birthday, by the way.”
He pulled a bottle of sherry from under the bar, and handed it to him. “On the house.”
John looked down at the label, and back up at the bartender with a deadpan glare. “Very funny. Where is she?”
The bartender merely let a smile draw across his face, before turning away.
At the same time as that conversation was playing out, the bartender was also listening to Quinn ask his brother about what he’d seen through the Reality Lens; and Colin, perhaps out of some sense of gratitude to the bartender for the help he’d once provided, evaded the question.
The next to enter was Al Calavicci, the third one around here to go by the name Al. The bartender was glad he was nigh-omniscient, or else he might have started getting confused.
Al strode to the bar, frowning. He slammed his hand down.
“Alright, listen, whoever you are: where’s Sam?”
The bartender shrugged. “I don’t know, but…” he looked down at his reservations sheet, letting his finger trace across the paper. “The reservation is under the name Sam, so why don’t you have some wings and wait? He’s bound to show up.”
The bartender looked towards the door, where another car load was entering: Maggie, Rembrandt, and the one who’d driven them there, Tom Beckett.
The bartender’s gaze shifted between Al Prime and Maggie, and he stifled a laugh as Al’s cigar dropped out of his mouth at the sight of her.
“Holy cannoli,” he breathed. Maggie paused for a moment, as she took in the two Al Calaviccis present. She wandered up to the Al she hadn’t met with a raised eyebrow.
“Do I have a stain on my shirt, old man? My eyes are up here.” she said, folding her arms, and pointing to her face.
Al Prime retrieved his cigar from the floor, and stamped it out into the ash tray on the bar. “I was just gonna say you have a lovely pair of… eyes.”
At this, John gave a visible cringe, and placed a hand on Maggie’s shoulder. “Look, he and Sherri were… you know. He never saw her this young.”
Maggie relaxed a little as John turned to Al. “You might want to adjust your expectations on the state of Sherri’s eyes, Al.”
Al squinted. “I thought you told me she didn’t make it.”
John hesitated a moment. “Uh, things have… changed since then. Last I heard she escaped the Kromaggs, but I don’t know what happened to her after that. She never returned.”
The roar of a motorcycle heralded the next guest, and the bartender gave her a nod of greeting as she entered.
“Ah, the little lady with the big bike,” he said cheerfully. Alia responded with a scowl.
“I don’t have the patience for your games today,” she said, throwing her helmet aside. “Where are they? Sam and Thames?”
The bartender’s gaze moved around the room, finding every set of eyes looking at him, awaiting an answer.
“Nobody’s eating the buffalo wings,” he said, pointing at the untouched platter. “Come on, I worked hard on those. First wings, then answers. Deal?”
The promise of answers finally got the guests to descend on the platter. Several minutes later, just a few remained. The bartender smiled, knowing his dish was a hit.
“Okay, we ate your damn wings,” said Rembrandt. “Now we got questions in need of some answers.”
“Well,” said the bartender, “You only turn fifty once. So let’s all make sure Sam Beckett has a lovely birthday. Everyone get ready to yell ‘surprise,’ okay?”
The bar’s patrons all looked at each other, bewildered. The bartender frowned. “What, were my instructions unclear or something?”
He gestured a ‘shoo’ motion with his hands.
“Everyone hide and get ready to jump out, would you?”
Across the bar, he noticed John sighing heavily. But, reluctantly, the guests all moved to positions that had wildly varying levels of obscurity.
“Oh, good enough,” said the bartender, before ducking behind the bar.
There was a short moment of silence, before the door opened.
The bartender jumped up, arms outstretched.
“Surprise!” he shouted, a lone voice in the quiet room. The bartender gave a withering look at all his guests, who were silently peeking out from their spots.
At the entrance, Sam’s jaw was hanging open. “What—”
Behind him, Sherri and Thames poked their heads into the bar. Sherri’s single eye looked like it was about to pop out of her head to join its partner. Thames, on the other hand, looked highly amused at the strange situation.
“Sam! Buddy!” Al was the first to make a move, crossing to his friend and drawing him into a hug. “This whole stupid charade was worth it now.”
Sam, still trying to find his words, looked down at Al.
“It’s good to see you, but… what is all this?”
“Apparently this nutcase—” Al pointed a finger at the bartender, “—organised a birthday party for you. D’you know you’re fifty today?”
Sam’s eyebrows met with confusion. “I am? I swear it was January a minute ago.”
The bartender piped up, giving a sage look: “Time flies when—”
“Oh, shut up already,” said both Als in unison.
Sherri’s eye fell upon John, Al Prime, and Will, and she crossed to them, hand over her smiling mouth.
“You guys…”
John’s eyes immediately filled with tears as he pressed his arms around her.
“It took all of us, but we finally accomplished the mission.”
Meanwhile, Thames had spotted Alia. She approached him with apprehension, as he traipsed towards her to meet her halfway.
“Hey, Alia,” he said, whispering as if he was sharing a secret with her. He pointed towards the bartender. “Sam thinks that guy is God.”
He stifled a laugh, and Alia rolled her eyes. “Yeah. I know.”
Thames turned towards the bartender, who had his hands perched on his hips.
“I think if you’re God, you should probably at least get some better ventilation in this dump. This place reeks of cigars.”
The bartender stroked his chin. “Hmm, I guess I could get a few vents installed to improve the air quality. But listen, I have a job proposition for the pair of you. Talk to me later, alright?”
He let that sit with them as he grabbed a glass, and tapped a butter knife against it.
“Friends, can I get your attention, please?”
All eyes moved to him, and he smiled at his ability to herd these cats.
“I want you all to have a nice time tonight, but I need you to know that last call is at twelve-thirty sharp. So keep an eye on the time. Oh, and I wouldn’t mind a chat with each of you tonight, so come say ‘hi’ at some point, alright? There’s a lot to discuss.”
He gave a crooked grin to his guests. “Drinks are on the house, by the way. But pace yourselves. Don’t forget the designated drivers.”
Sam took a seat on a stool, gazing at the bartender quietly.
“Happy birthday, Sam.”
“It was my birthday last time we met.” Sam’s face was serene, but curious.
“So it was. Fifty years went by in a flash, didn’t it?”
“Thank you for… whatever this is. I’m glad to see everyone.” He squinted. “Who are you?”
The bartender tilted his head, as he wandered to the beer taps. “Sam, we’ve covered this. I’m Al.”
Sam leaned forward. “You’re not, though… are you? You look just like a guy I met on my first leap. I assume there’s a purpose behind why you’ve chosen this face.”
“Someone’s got all their memories, I see.”
The bartender slid a schooner of Schlitz across the bar to Sam, and he picked it up with amusement.
“Yeah. I’m brimming with memories, even ones that haven’t happened yet. Why is that?” He took a swig of the beer, keeping his eyes trained on the bartender.
“Don’t ask me; it’s your string theory, isn’t it?”
Sam’s gaze intensified.
“This conversation isn’t over,” he said, picking up his glass and turning towards the rest of the party. “But I assume you brought all my friends together for a reason, so I’m going to try and suss out what that is.”
The bartender nodded. “Enjoy the party. And try the buffalo wings.”
The tinny, slightly fuzzy strains of YMCA by The Village People drifted from a poorly tuned radio on a wall shelf, as Sherri grasped John’s hand, finally letting herself believe her ordeal was over. He squeezed her hand back, both relieved that they could feel the warmth from the other, and keep a hold of their entirely solid forms.
She glanced for a moment at Sam, as the implications of this being his fiftieth birthday dawned on her.
Is it really the year 2003? It’s been five years since I leaped?
“Do you know what happened to Tim and Janet?” she asked. “Did they make it back?”
“Yes, they’re safe now. Dropped into Earth Prime back in February.”
Sherri bit her lip. “February of… two thousand and three…?”
“You got it. Right in front of Quinn and Maggie.” John turned towards the bar. “Have a feeling Q had something to do with that.”
“Q… oh!” Sherri remembered John’s postulation about the nature of the ‘higher power.’ Then, she noticed he was gesturing a hand towards the man behind the bar.
“Sherri, I think this is our Q.”
Sherri’s brow furrowed. “What, the bartender?”
John looked back at her with a funny look. “Believe me, he’s no bartender.”
Sherri stared at the stout gentleman with an apron. He glanced at her, and smiled.
“Can I get you a drink? Seems like you might need one after what you’ve been through.”
Sherri raised an eyebrow. “And you know what I’ve been through because you’re…”
“I’m observant,” he said, pouring a glass of red wine, and placing it on the bar in front of her. “Doesn’t look like you willingly gave up that eye, for a start.”
Sherri felt herself becoming self-conscious about her eye socket, and took the wine before turning away from the strange little man behind the bar.
“I say all you need’s a pirate patch and you’ll look like the biggest badass in this joint,” said Al Prime, before lighting a cigar. “Not that you weren’t already, of course.”
He moved closer to her, inspecting the vacant socket.
“So it’s true those ape guys eat eyeballs?”
Sherri snorted. “Yeah. I’m still hoping mine will get lodged in the throat of whatever one of those jerks tries to eat it. But I’ll settle for ruining their invasion plans.”
“So you really did it, huh?”
“Yeah, but it seems like I may not have the first time around,” she said, looking questioningly at John. “Why else would Sam have shown up?”
John looked at the ground for a moment. “I only remember as much as you, now; my memory was changed when Sam leaped in. But, by all accounts, the original timeline was…”
“I remember the original timeline,” said Will. John looked at him wide-eyed.
“You do?”
“Yeah. No memory changes while I’ve been standing around in here.” Will looked at Sherri with sad eyes. “They did a thing that messed with your aura and stopped Higgins from being able to retrieve you, and then they killed you. I’ve been dealing with it for months.”
“Oh, Will. I’m sorry.”
She wrapped her arms around the tired man.
“Well this time, the only casualty was…” she swallowed. “Nexus Quinn. He died helping us.”
“Maybe not…” said John, looking at Al. “Apparently he might have… stopped in here.”
Sherri glared at John. “What…?”
* * *
Alia leaned against the bar, as Thames pressed his back against it beside her, and leaned back to see her face, elbows resting on the bar.
“Hey, Alia…” he said, grinning. “I bet you never got as close to Sam as I just did. We just completely shared a mind. Did you know he’s totally in love with you? But that’s nothing special, because he falls in love like ten times a year. Dude is a hopeless romantic. I think if I sweet-talked him, he might fall in love with me.”
Alia didn’t answer, opting instead to intensely stare at the bartender, waiting for him to pay her some attention.
I don’t think it’s a secret that I’m also in love with Sam, but that’s just too bad, isn’t it? He’s married.
“Alia. Aliaaa… Aliiia, talk to me, babe.”
Alia flicked him a warning look. “Shut up. We’re not friends, Thames. You’re free, so I’ve fulfilled my obligation to you. You don’t have to pretend you care about me in the least.”
She leaned further forward so she couldn’t see his face. This prompted him to slide himself onto the bar, becoming almost entirely horizontal except for his lower legs, which wrapped around the bar stool for support.
“What if I want to be friends?” he said, pouting. “And what if I can help you take down Lothos? I never got to tell you what he wants, did I?”
This caught Alia’s attention. “No, you didn’t.” She stared down at him as his mouth curled into a smile.
He pulled himself up to a standing position, and folded his arms.
“Okay, I want you to picture the most unhinged, but extremely unsurprising reason some rich-ass mother might start trying to rearrange their present by screwing around in the past.”
“Uhh…” Alia scratched her head. “I dunno. Taking over the world?”
“Ha! That would at least be interesting! Think more mundane.”
“… Money?”
“Ding ding ding!” Thames threw her a finger gun. “All about the Benjamins. Literally they are taking out competition, disgracing political opposition, wrecking lives; everything merely for the benefit of a goddamn corporate monopoly.”
“You can’t be serious.”
“These people have the capitalist dragon sickness. They already had so much cash to throw around that they could build and run Lothos, but they gotta have more and more.” He shrugged. “Admittedly, I was in on it at first. Dollar signs in my eyes. Then…”
“Then you got stuck leaping and you realised there was no way you were getting a cent,” Alia finished.
Thames gave her a sheepish shrug. “Yeah. But, you know, back in my hacker days? I loved making rich guys squirm. I was a regular pinko. Would have wanted to break the kneecaps of the guy I ended up becoming.”
“And you want me to believe you’re not that guy any more?” Alia frowned.
“You can prove it, if you like,” came the voice of the bartender. Alia and Thames shifted their gazes toward him, expectant.
“We’re listening,” said Alia, leaning towards him. He met her eye, with a light smile.
“Ever wonder how Lothos never found you before that little contraption of yours brought you here?” His eyes twinkled. “I had you hidden away in a parallel dimension.”
Alia’s brows met. “What?!”
Is that why everything felt so wrong all the time? Little things. Details were off. Like the Mandela Effect.
As if he knew her thoughts, the bartender nodded.
“Makes sense now, doesn’t it?” he said. “I allowed the leap signal to leak through to you, and when you stopped in here, you passed back into your original world.”
“So you really are God?”
The bartender laughed. “Don’t give me a big head. I’m just… clever. That’s all.”
Alia exchanged a look with Thames, whose eyes were like saucers.
“I want to offer both of you a choice,” continued the bartender. “I can send you back there, if you aren’t prepared to face Lothos. Or, you can face him with my support. Catch is, you’ll be leaping just a little longer. What do you say?”
“I’m in,” Alia said, without hesitation. She eyed Thames, who seemed a little less decisive.
I mean… I won’t blame him if he chooses to run. I wonder if he has a conscience for that decision to weigh on?
“You know what,” said Thames, after a moment, “maybe it is time for the proletariat to rise up against the bourgeoisie.”
He slammed a fist on the bar. “Down with the capitalist pigs! Viva la revolution!”
Alia looked at Thames with a new respect.
“I think your time with Sam did you good,” she murmured, and the pair shared a grin for a moment, before he broke away.
“I think so too. Speaking of which…”
* * *
As Sam finished his beer, he felt Thames grab his wrist and begin jerking him toward an empty corner of the tavern, a cheerful spring in his step.
“So bestie, we gonna talk about it?” Thames asked, a playful grin on his face. Sam pursed his lips.
“About what, specifically?”
As if I have to ask.
“Mind melding like that was pretty intimate, right?” he put a thumb to his lips, performing a bashful expression that wasn’t at all sincere.
“‘Intimate’ is one word for it,” said Sam, frowning. “‘Disturbing’ might be another. For me, at least. Some of the things I saw in your head…”
“You know I had no choice in that stuff. Most of it.” Thames poked his fingers into his cheeks, mimicking dimples. “Anyway, I think you rubbed off on me, ’cause I’m joining up with Alia to take down Lothos.”
“You are? That’s great!”
“But I do this for the good guys under one teensy condition. A favour, if you will. One that won’t hurt anyone, and you can do it right now.”
Sam gave him a cynical eyebrow hike, suddenly knowing through his intuition what the request would be. Thames pointed to John, over by Sherri, and grinned.
“You and him gotta smooch.” He brought his hands together, and made a kissing sound as the fingertips touched. Sam glared at him from under a heavy brow.
“Thames…”
“Come oooon! Humour me! I wanna see you two handsome protagonists share a steamy moment.”
Sam glared at Thames, as the hyperactive leaper clasped his hands in a pleading gesture.
“You can tell him it’s from me.” Thames grabbed a hold of Sam’s shoulders and planted a wet kiss on his lips. As he pulled away, Sam wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, distaste written on his face.
“Thames, it’s not cool to just grab someone and do that, you know.”
“Then ask him, whatever. Get your consent. But I wanna see those tongues touch, baby.”
“I meant you shouldn’t just do that.”
Despite his displeasure at this whole situation, he nonetheless found himself beckoning his double over. John looked at the pair with curiosity as he approached.
“Did I just see you guys kiss?” he asked, eyebrows high.
“He kissed me,” said Sam, with a narrow-eyed glance at the man with whom he’d shared quite a lot more than just a kiss recently. “And now he’s holding me ransom. In exchange for taking down Lothos, he wants us to… you know.”
John’s eyes widened, and his cheeks went bright red. “Uhh, wow.”
Sam sighed. “I know. It’s up to y—”
Sam was cut off by John’s lips pressing against his.
Wow, I actually didn’t see that coming.
As the kiss went on, Sam’s mind began to start throwing up memories of John’s life, distinct from his own. Memories of living in San Francisco, of building a project not unlike his own, but sufficiently divergent to be unnerving. Teaching Quinn and Colin. Observing Sherri.
Oh, this is unexpected.
Moments of triumph, and harrowing moments of anxiously watching Sherri go through torment, unable to take her hand, only able to distract her from the pain as she endured it. The feelings of loss when she had disappeared, and even the divergent path where she had not survived.
And it made him realise how Al must feel.
Then it was over, as John pulled back, laughing.
“That was really weird,” he said, his face still flushed. He put a hand on his mouth, and looked away from Sam.
Sam was still reeling from the experience that he clearly hadn’t shared with John.
For a moment there, it was like I was him.
He began to wonder if every version of him out there could be reached in this way, and the idea of travelling the multiverse, kissing his doubles made him burst with laughter. The two Sams shared their moment of levity, as Thames watched on with the expression of a child cuddling their teddy bear.
“Aw, you guys,” he said, pulling the two of them by the shoulders towards him, “that was everything I could have hoped for. You two should open an OnlyFans together.”
John looked at him, puzzled. Sam just shook his head, eyes rolling.
I know what that is somehow, but I won’t dignify it with an answer.
Thames turned to Alia, gesturing for her to come over. She obliged, but kept her eyes trained on Sam.
“I didn’t know you swung both ways,” she said with a grin.
“Uh, me neither,” mumbled Sam, biting his lip.
Do I?
… Nah.
Then again…?
Well I’m a married man. And I remember that this time. Dear god, what would Donna think of what I just did?
Is two of the same guy a turn-on for women?
Oh god, Thames rubbed off on me too. Or was it John?
Sam’s cheeks burned, and he figured he must look just as flustered as John. Alia just looked on with a tight-lipped smile, her eyes dancing.
Alia put a hand against Sam’s cheek. “We’ll meet again some day, won’t we?”
Sam smiled back. “Count on it.”
She then moved to John, and took his hands. “Thank you for everything, John. I’m glad I stopped here for gas that morning.”
“Come on, bring it in,” he said, and hugged her.
Thames grabbed a hold of Alia’s hand. “You ready to do this, babe?”
“Only if you promise never to call me ‘babe’ again.”
With a nod towards the bartender, the two of them vanished in a blue light, leaping to parts unknown to anyone but the man presently running a damp rag over the bar.
As Sherri was discussing the topic of eyeballs with Al Prime, Quinn was ordering a glass of beer from the mysterious bartender. With the tech in his and John’s pockets that they’d cobbled together as insurance for escaping this strange place, he figured he might as well make the most of the ‘party’ while they were all together.
As he wandered back from the bar, he came up behind a pensive Colin, seated at a table, and plucked a hair from his head. Colin jumped, taken by complete surprise.
“Jeez, what was that for?” he said with one brow low and a poorly veiled smirk.
“Just wanted to snap you out of whatever’s going on with you,” explained Quinn as he placed the beer on the table and took his seat. He flicked a finger across Colin’s shirt pocket, coming into contact with the folded up Reality Lens.
“What did you see?” he said, gazing into his brother’s haunted eyes. “You can tell me, Colin.”
Colin looked down at his tightly clasped hands. “He asked me to keep quiet about it for now.”
Even to me?
Quinn gave his brother a questioning look.
“I want to tell you,” Colin continued, “but you know I owe him one. We’ll talk about this later.”
Colin’s eyes wandered to the bar, where they locked with the bartender, who was silently polishing a glass. The gaze of the man then shifted to Quinn, and he gave an amiable nod that served only to make Quinn more uncomfortable, before turning to talk to Alia and Thames.
Rembrandt pulled a chair up to the table, staring with narrow eyes at the leaper who’d impersonated him.
“You really think that guy’s on our side?” he asked. Quinn frowned.
“Don’t know, man. What those guys made him do wasn’t entirely his fault, if that helps.”
Rembrandt sighed. “It doesn’t.”
Colin cradled his chin in his hand. “The Thames I know online has a pretty strong set of principles. But I suppose that doesn’t count for much now.”
Maggie was the next to join the group at the table.
“What do you guys make of all this?” she asked, frowning. Quinn was about to answer, when he spotted Thames kissing Sam.
“I can honestly say, I don’t know what to make of anything right now,” he mumbled, eyes wide.
The next thing Quinn witnessed was John approaching the pair, followed by another kiss between the doubles.
“Well there’s an image I can never unsee,” said Maggie, her mouth hanging open.
As the two Sams began to laugh, their faces beet red, Quinn relaxed a little.
“Meh, they’re not the only ones around here to have made out with their doubles,” he said, before taking a large gulp of his drink as the eyes of Colin, Remy, and Maggie fixed on him.
“You did what?” Colin asked, eyebrows high.
“What? She was cute, alright?” He looked bashfully into the foam of his beer. “I swear to you, I didn’t know she was a murderer at the time.”
The conversation was cut short by the blue light emanating from Thames and Alia, and all eyes shot to them as they leaped away.
“I’m pretty sure that was…” Maggie bit her lip. “Oh, jeez. That bartender doesn’t plan on leaping us around, does he? Is that what he brought us all here for? To draft us?”
“Yeah, no chance I’m agreeing to that,” said Rembrandt, shaking his head. “Had about enough of this crazy time travel business.”
“You’ve got me all wrong,” said the bartender, as he approached their table. “I actually wanted the four of you here because I have a limited time offer for you folks.”
He grabbed a chair from an adjacent table, and sat on it back-to-front, leaning his plump arms on the top of the backrest.
“Don’t worry, it doesn’t involve leaping. But it’s gonna be a tough choice.”
“Out with it, then,” said Quinn, crossing his arms. “And don’t dress it up in your folksy crap.”
The bartender gave him a conceding look. “If you say so. Pay attention, okay? This might get complicated.”
He pulled a notepad and pen from his apron pocket, and placed the pad on the table. He drew two lines running parallel.
“So imagine these two lines as the timelines of your Earth, and Sam’s Earth, past to present. As you know, you jump from universe to universe by opening a bridge from one to the other,” he explained, drawing a straight perpendicular line between the parallel lines. “These two worlds were once a single world, until a point of divergence occurred, at the observation of a quantum superposition.”
He drew a few branches from each line, that continued parallel.
Quinn leaned back. “Thanks for ‘Baby’s First Quantum Mechanics Lesson.’ Get to the point.”
The bartender chuckled. “Right, right. So, this divergence occurs naturally, until time travel is involved. Then things get a little caca.”
He drew a new branch, which looped back to the same line.
“So when you go back here, your alterations cause the original timeline to jump to a newly created branch, while the new timeline overwrites the old. That’s why your memories get changed around. That’s how it normally works, anyway. But you guys changed your Earth’s past from Sam’s Earth, with your changes undoing the need for you to have ever been here in the first place. The multiverse didn’t know what to do with you, since you have versions that never left your Earth after arriving back in 1998. Three out of the four of you have turned yourselves into cosmic loose ends.”
Some bartender. This guy is a time lord or something.
Quinn squinted at the paper. “If our alterations just created new branches, doesn’t that mean there must still be a version of the Kromaggs out there with the tech that could find their way to us?”
The bartender grinned. “If you can picture a third dimension to my drawing, that’s where the old timeline goes. It’s essentially an isolated pocket dimension. If someone attempts to open a wormhole from there, back to our axis, it’ll fail, unless they manage to travel back in time to the point of divergence. And let’s all pray they never figure that one out.”
“So we already knew we’ve been… replaced,” said Quinn. “The Professor and I already drew that conclusion. But how are you supposed to help?”
“Like I said, I have a one-time offer for you,” the bartender said, grinning, and gesturing to the exit. “Out there, you’ll find San Francisco, Earth Prime, 2003. Walk out there now, and you will seamlessly merge into the other version of yourself. You’ll forget any of this happened, and continue on with your life happy and safe, with Wade and your parents.”
Wade…?
Quinn’s eyes shot to the window. Sure enough, the scene had changed from a dark desert to a thriving downtown street.
“So we’ll just be assimilated into the other us?” asked Quinn. “How exactly is that distinct from us dying? The outcome is the same, right?”
“Well, how about your brother here? Did the old version of him die? Or is he still in there?” The bartender turned an eye to Colin. “What do you think?”
Colin looked at Quinn with wide eyes.
“I think we’re the same guy…” he said. “I mean, I have fragments of memories from the old timeline. Not much, but they’re there.”
He squinted at the bartender. “You told me I’d be the same in here.” He tapped a finger to his chest. “But how can I possibly know if that’s true?”
“It’s a philosophical conundrum, I agree. This is why I’m allowing you the choice. You could become the versions of yourselves that you worked so hard to create, or you could choose a different path. You can keep your memories, but you won’t have your old lives. It’s a trade-off.”
The bartender shrugged. “Think about it. Just make your decision before closing time.”
He stood from the chair, popping the notepad back into his pocket.
“Wait a second, what about me?” Colin piped up. “I don’t have a double.”
“That’s correct. You can do anything you’d like, Colin. You have a life to return to, or not. As far as anyone will know, you’ve been travelling with doubles.”
Quinn frowned. “So let’s just assume that all of us went through the door. Would Colin be the only one who remembered us as we are... and all this?”
The bartender nodded. “That’s the way it is.”
Quinn glanced at his brother. “As tempting as the offer is, I don’t think I can give up these memories.”
“No way in hell,” agreed Maggie. “I don’t want to forget Uncle Sam… or everything we’ve done. I don’t care how blissful our lives on Earth Prime are.”
Colin smiled. “Then it’s decided. So what do we do now?”
“Wait a second, I haven’t decided nothing,” said Rembrandt. “Let me think about it some.”
I guess he’s had a tougher time than the rest of us.
Besides the recent experience of torture, Rembrandt’s scars ran deep, dating back to the invasion. Quinn knew how much Remy had changed since then, and he had been banking on undoing it all for all these years.
“It’s okay,” he said, putting a hand on Rembrandt’s shoulder. “Your life, your choice. We’ll support you either way.”
Colin looked up at the bartender. “Give me one of your umbrella cocktails,” he said.
The bartender obliged, and as Rembrandt sat lost in thought, Colin dropped the paper umbrella into his shirt pocket.
“If you decide to leave us… here’s a little something to remember me by. Even if you don’t… actually remember me.”
Rembrandt never did meet Colin before the invasion, did he?
Quinn leaned his elbows on the table, and sat in a daze as he considered the choice, and the possibility of Rembrandt finding peace.
“What are you gonna do now?” asked Will, as Sherri watched John returning to their corner of the bar. She opted not to bring up the kiss she’d witnessed.
“Me? Well, my mission is over. I think I’ve sacrificed enough of myself to justify retirement, don’t you?” she gestured to her eye socket, smirking.
“Retirement’s great,” Al chimed in. “Turns out you can just relax all day, and if anybody calls you lazy, you can just say you’re a war vet and they shut up about it.”
He eyed Sherri. “Nobody needs to know what you’re a veteran of. But you got the war wounds to prove it now.”
Sherri gave him a mischievous look. “Maybe we can move to Florida together and shuffleboard.”
Al chortled. “I don’t think them geezers would be able to keep up with the two of us.”
“Sherri,” interjected John as he approached, “you do know your Dad’s here… right?”
He gestured to the far wall where Tom was alone, silently looking in their direction.
“Good for him,” she said, looking the other way, taking a nonchalant sip of her wine. The sip became a gulp, then she just turned it upside down, finishing it.
John frowned. “He’s been talking to Maggie quite a bit; I think you should give him a chance. Talk to him. This could be your last opportunity.”
Sherri ran a hand through her half-shaved hair. “I don’t know what more there is to say to him.”
“You could start with ‘hello,’” said Sam, who’d appeared beside her. She jumped, and looked between the two Sams, who were giving her the puppy dog look.
“Family meeting?” Sam asked. John nodded and looked at Sherri expectantly, and she sighed; there was no fighting the immense guilt tripping power of two Uncle Sams.
“Ugh. You both owe me one,” she said, with one eye rolling, as they escorted her to her father’s table.
Tom looked up at her with wide, frightened eyes.
“You look like you’ve… been through the wringer,” he said quietly. Sherri glanced back towards Al Prime for a moment before answering.
“Yeah, I just got back from a tour of duty,” she said, taking a seat across from him and folding her arms. John and Sam flanked the two of them on either side of the table, silently waiting for the conversation to unfold.
“You’re a hero, Mag— uh, Sherri.” Her father smiled at her, and for a moment, Sherri thought she detected admiration.
Did he just…
Sherri looked at him, her eye welling with tears. “So, it took my saving the multiverse for you to give me unqualified praise.”
At that moment, Maggie leaned over Sherri from behind, placing a hand on each shoulder.
“Go on, Pops,” she prompted. “Tell her what you told me.”
Tom bit his lip, and avoided the eyes of the family members that surrounded him.
“I’m sorry for being more of a drill sergeant than a father to you,” he said. “And if I’d known about Billy, I probably would have come to Madera and kicked his ass myself.”
He looked up into Sherri’s eye. “I’m proud of you, and I was proud of you long before you saved the multiverse. I was just too stubborn to say it. I won’t ask you to forgive me, but I’m glad I had this chance to apologise. I love you, Maggie.”
Sherri was silent for a moment, as the lump in her throat threatened to let loose the urge to weep.
“My name is Sherri,” she finally managed to choke out, as a tear rolled down her cheek. She let out a chuckle, wiping it away.
“Right… sorry,” Tom murmured.
On either side, Sam and John were beaming at each other. Sam placed a hand on his brother’s shoulder, while John took Sherri’s hand.
“Thank you, Tom,” said John. “Sherri means more to me than anyone, and…”
He paused, getting choked up himself.
“What John is trying to say,” Sam continued, “is that he appreciates you opening up and giving Sherri much deserved praise.”
Sam looked across the table at his double. “Right?”
John nodded.
“Maggie?” Sherri said, looking upward at her younger counterpart. “Could you get me a glass of wine? I think I need another drink.”
* * *
As Maggie strode to the bar to fulfill Sherri’s request, John stood from his seat, spotting the two Als engaged in conversation.
Oh boy, I shudder to think what kind of chitchat is happening there. And yet, I must know.
He scurried over to the part of the bar where they stood, shrouded in a cloud of tobacco smoke, as Will stood back, away from the polluted air.
“What are they talkin’ about?” whispered John to the frowning programmer. He raised an eyebrow.
“Beth.”
Of course.
John tuned his ears to their discussion, as the radio on the wall played a muffled Purple Haze.
“All daughters?” Al Prime said, gesturing wildly with his cigar.
“Yeah, and you know what? My youngest is a genius, just like Sam.” The older Al leaned on the bar with one arm, while pulling his wallet out of his back pocket. As he showed his double some photos, John’s attention shifted back to Will.
“Well, that’s unexpectedly wholesome,” he commented. Will nodded, and gazed towards the floor.
After a moment, he spoke: “Why am I here?”
John gave him an inquisitive look. “Huh?”
Will gestured around the tavern. “This Q guy brought all you guys here for a purpose. Even Al’s got that other Al to talk to. But me? Why have I been trapped here?”
John furrowed his brow. “Huh, good question.”
He turned a head towards the bartender, who was already looking his way. The man tapped his hand on the bar, and gave a beckoning motion. John exchanged a glance with Will, and the two of them approached him.
“Could you hear us just now?” John asked him. The bartender nodded.
“A bartender’s always gotta be paying attention to the local gossip.”
John glared at him. “Aren’t we past your little routine at this point?”
The bartender frowned. “Why does nobody like my ‘little routine?’ What’s wrong with it?”
“We’re all very tired,” Will said as he took a seat on a stool, and slumped onto the bar with his arms. “So please, just be straight with us. What am I here for?”
The bartender placed a bottle of orange juice in front of Will.
“Here. I know you don’t drink.” He leaned on the bar, arms spread out, and assessed the two men. “Will, John… the two of you need each other.”
John tilted his head. “What?”
The bartender looked down at Will. “Focusing on work at the expense of your mental health.” He looked up at John.
“Ignoring your own needs.” He began pulling a beer from a tap labelled Schlitz. “You both need someone you can be completely open with.”
He placed the beer in front of John. “And I mean completely.”
“What are you getting at?” John asked, struggling to understand.
“This is what I’m talking about,” the bartender said, with an exasperated sigh. “You two are clueless. I couldn’t just let you two look past each other for the rest of your lives. John, Will would never say it, so allow me: he’s crazy about you.”
He is?
Will straightened at this announcement, his eyes popping wide open.
“H-hey…” he stuttered. “That… that’s not true—”
“Uh-uh-uh,” said the bartender, waving a finger, “I’m Q, remember? You can’t lie to the likes of me, kid.”
John looked down at Will with a crooked smile. “I didn’t know you felt that way.”
Will, going red in the face, covered his eyes. “It’s not like I was planning to let you in on that,” he muttered.
“I saw the disaster that was your dalliance with Jack,” the bartender continued. “And there’s only a few people you can be honest with. One of them just happened to already have a crush on you.”
He winked. “Eighty-six percent chance of… going the distance.”
John raised an eyebrow, as he took a hold of the drink the bartender had given him.
“Thanks for that, Higgins.” He raised the glass to his lips, taking a drink of a beer that tasted familiar, but he had no idea why.
The bartender chuckled. “Higgins may be a lot of things, but a matchmaker he ain’t. Good thing I’m here.”
“You said that like you and Higgins are pals.”
“Oh sure, we go way back,” the bartender said, chuckling.
John couldn’t tell if he was kidding or not. And as he took another sip of his drink, he sensed another presence beside him, on the opposite side to Will. His eyes met Sam, who was looking at he and Will with a grin.
“You two’ll make a cute couple,” he said, prompting John to glare.
“Were you eavesdropping just now?”
Sam shrugged. “Didn’t have to. I just knew.”
Oh, right. What is the deal with Sam now?
“You never did see Verbena, did you?”
John shook his head. Sam looked sadly at him for a moment, before pulling him into a hug.
“Holograms have it tougher than I realised,” he murmured. “Having to just watch when someone you love is in pain or fighting for their lives. They get physical scars, and you get mental ones.”
John felt his words like a gut punch.
“Oh, you know, I can’t complain,” he said in a high-pitched voice. “Sherri’s the one putting her life on the line.”
Sam’s warm hand patted against the back of John’s neck, and he let go, pulling away and looking John in the eye.
“You owe yourself more kindness, Sam.”
He called me Sam.
With that, Sam turned to the bartender.
“So, are you going to tell me why I now know everything about my double, or are you going to wink at me and say something enigmatic?”
Everything?
The bartender chuckled. “Know thyself,” he said, and winked.
Sam let his head drop to one side, as he glared at the man in the same exasperated way John had seen him glare at Al on occasion.
“What do you mean you know everything about me?” asked John.
Sam scratched the back of his head. “Well, when you kissed me, it was like I absorbed your whole life into me all at once. But it goes back further than that. I knew about Thames because I knew it through you. It’s like I can reach out to versions of myself, wherever and whenever they are.” He grimaced, struggling to form words. “And… Ziggy was built with some of me in her. You wanted to know why I had a sixth sense about things? I think I was tapping into her.”
He turned back to the bartender. “All this new awareness, and I still can’t figure out what role you play in all of this. Are you the cause of this?”
“No more than you are, Sam.” The bartender smirked, and leaned in closer. “Trust me.”
The clock struck twelve-thirty, and the bartender announced last call, as Al sat reclined on a chair, his feet hoist up on another. Beside him, Sam had taken a seat, and together they were looking upon the crowd. The radio played the song by Billy Joel that Sam had performed the night after he’d returned.
Sherri, sitting across from her father, was engaged in conversation, while Maggie hovered. Will and John were standing closely, talking about something or other. The other version of Al – clad in the most handsome of clothes – was speaking with Quinn. Colin and Rembrandt shared a quiet moment at the bar.
“Won’t be long ’til I have to go, I guess,” Sam murmured.
Al sighed. “You’re really doing it, huh? Leaving for good?”
Sam gave him a resolute nod. He was smiling, but his eyes glimmered with emotion.
“Doesn’t mean I can’t visit once in a while, does it? I’m getting better at controlling this thing.”
Al reached out to his friend, and grabbed his hand. “If you don’t, I’m gonna try to find you anyway, so you’d better just save me the trouble.”
Sam squeezed his hand.
“Al, thanks for all the support you’ve given me. When I first leaped I hadn’t even considered what I would be putting you through, y’know? Having to be on call day and night, able to do nothing but watch all the stupid things I did.” He chuckled. “I thought I had it bad, but you had to put up with me. And you never complained.”
Al snorted. “Tell that to Beth.” He grinned, taking a cigar from his jacket pocket.
“Well, anyway,” Sam continued, “I just recently came to understand how tough it is to be the hologram, and I wanted to make it clear that I’m grateful to have had you there.”
That’s thoughtful.
“Sam, you’re gonna make me choke up,” Al said, as he lit the cigar. After taking a puff, he assessed his best friend, who he’d rarely seen this calm and self-assured. At least, not until recently. And he realised in that moment that Sam would be entirely fine on his own.
Can’t say it doesn’t hurt, but he don’t need me.
“What’ll you do now?” Sam asked.
“Guess I’ll hang up the handlink and retire, like my clone over there,” Al said, gesturing across the room to his double. “Quality time with the family, and all that cornball hokum.”
“Think you can give up those things, Al?” Sam said, pointing a finger at the cigar. “Every puff you take, I see minutes falling off your lifespan.”
Al looked sheepishly down at the smouldering cancer stick.
“Jeez, when you put it like that, it doesn’t seem worth it…” He stuck it between his teeth. “Then again…”
He breathed in some smoke, and gestured to the radio, quoting the song playing as the smoke curled out of his mouth: “Keep it to yourself, it’s my life.”
Sam sighed. “Yeah well, that’s what my Dad said. Just think about it.”
For anyone else, I probably wouldn’t.
“Sure thing,” he conceded. “But you’re, I dunno, psychic or something now, right? Will I quit?”
“Psychic, huh?” Sam smirked at him, and held out his hand like he was holding something round. “Magic 8 Ball, will Al ever give up smoking?”
He shook his hand, and gazed into his palm.
“Reply hazy, try again.” He winked at Al. “You know as well as I do that things aren’t set in stone. I’ll leave it in your capable hands.”
Damn, am I ever gonna miss this guy.
“Listen, Al…” Sam leaned forward on his chair. “Make sure Donna and Sammy Jo are taken care of, would you?”
“Are you kidding? ’Course I will! Not that they can’t take care of themselves. Both of ’em got bright futures still to come.”
“Yeah,” agreed Sam. “I think you’re right.”
Al took a drag on the stogie between his fingers, and an ash tray appeared beside him, held by Tom.
“Now that’s service,” Al said, tapping his ash into it before taking it out of his hand.
“Just wanted to save that God guy some sweeping,” Tom said, before looking at his brother. “Sam, I’m about to leave, and apparently nobody’s interested in joining me.”
Sam gazed up at him. “John and Quinn have been planning their exit from this place for months. They only needed you to get them here. Thank you for doing that, by the way.”
“How do you know all that?” Tom asked, bewildered.
“Just call him Miss Cleo,” said Al.
Sam stood, and hugged his brother. “Take care of Mom and Katie.”
“So it’s true, then,” said Tom, “we’re never gonna see you again?”
“Keep an eye on your emails,” Sam replied. “Maybe I’ll send a ‘hello’ once in a while. Might not be in order, though.”
“Fair enough,” Tom said, smiling. He strode to the bartender.
“If I walk out of here, is it gonna still be August eighth, 2003?”
“Nope.” The bartender gestured to the clock. “Past midnight. It’s the ninth now. Your car’s out there waiting for you; go right ahead.”
Tom moved to the door, and turned for a final look.
“This has been a bizarre night. Goodbye, everyone…”
All at once, Al watched as John, Sam, Maggie and Sherri crossed to him. All but Sherri enclosed him in a tight group hug.
And finally, after the more affectionate three said their goodbyes, Sherri approached him.
“Catch you later, Pops,” she said, giving him a weak smile. Tom returned the look.
“Bye, Sherri,” he said, and turned to open the door. Before he proceeded, he looked back at her a final time. “I’m glad you chose your own path. You’re my hero.”
And then he was gone.
* * *
The last time Rembrandt had to make a decision this big, it had been a lot easier than this one. He’d been tantalisingly close to staying put on that world where he was a beloved superstar, only to have the rug pulled out from under him at the last minute by his double.
Now, he was facing another life-altering choice. Could he really rewind the clock to before the ’magg invasion, and carry on like the last five years had never happened? Or rather, have lived those years in a completely different way?
Colin had been the only one to really understand the choice he faced, and the two of them had spent a solid couple hours talking about it.
It wasn’t lost on him that the radio was now playing ‘Cry Like A Man.’
“Hey, it’s not like you can’t get to know me again after you’ve forgotten me,” Colin said, shrugging.
“You’ll be going back to Earth Prime?” Rembrandt asked.
“Of course!” Colin said. “Our parents are there, and they need to see I’m alright. But we’re going to stop in with our other parents first. That’s an appointment me and Quinn have been meaning to keep for the last twenty-five years.”
Rembrandt grinned. “Hope no mad scientist gets in the way of that this time around.”
“Don’t remind me,” said Colin with a cringe.
“Evening, Cryin’ Man,” said Sam, leaning against the bar. “I would ask if you’ve decided what you’re gonna do, but I get the feeling you’ve had your mind made up for a while, haven’t you?”
Yeah, guess he’s right.
Rembrandt eyed the genius doctor scientist who’d swept into their lives four years ago, making life a lot more interesting, and wondered if any part of his mind would recognise the guy once he walked out the door.
“I think it’s for the best,” he finally said.
Sam gave him a light pat on the back. “You deserve a chance at happiness.”
“I agree,” Quinn said, approaching the bar. “We’ve all seen how miserable you’ve been since we pulled you out of the ’magg cell. You don’t have to keep carrying that burden of something that no longer happened.”
He wrapped an arm around Remy’s shoulders. “Maybe we’ll even get to see your ’stache again.”
Rembrandt chuckled. “Q-ball, you can count on that.”
He glanced at the bartender. “All I gotta do is walk out the door? That’s it?”
The bartender nodded. “That’s it.”
He stood from his seat and faced the exit, as butterflies flitted around in his belly. He turned around, studying all the friends he was about to lose, and his eyes welled up.
“Ah, here come the waterworks,” he said, wiping at his eyes. “So long, y’all.”
Maggie rushed to him, eyes wide. “You’re going?”
Rembrandt nodded. “Yeah, Maggie. Wish I could say I’ll miss you, but there’s another Maggie through that door who’ll take your place, isn’t there?”
She gave him a tight hug. “Goodbye, Remy. Promise we’ll come visit some day and explain everything.”
“Damn right you will,” he said, laughing.
After exchanging hugs and final goodbyes with Quinn and Colin, Rembrandt peered out the window, at the San Fran street where Colin had once stumbled upon a strange little bar, opened the door, and stepped through.
He passed into the warm night air, stretching.
What a night, he thought, before realising that he couldn’t remember what he was doing here. He looked back, seeing a closed up bar.
Didn’t I just come from there?
Rembrandt shook his head, feeling a little confused. As he felt around for his cell phone to check the time, he felt something small and thin in his front pocket. A little paper umbrella. He looked at it curiously for a moment, then returned it to his pocket. He didn’t know why, but he wanted to keep it.
As he headed down the street, wondering why he didn’t remember what brought him here so late at night, he hummed a tune; an old Bill Withers song, ‘Lovely Day’.
He finally found his phone deep in an inner jacket pocket. He checked the time: 12:45 am, before noticing he had a voicemail.
He dialled the voicemail number and listened.
“Hey Remy!” came Wade’s voice. “Just wanted to invite you to a get-together tomorrow night at my place. Quinn and Maggie will be there. Even roped in the Professor this time. We haven’t all been together in a while, so I just thought it might be nice. Call me, okay?”
Sounds good, he thought, hanging up. It had been at least a year since he’d last seen Q-ball.
Oh boy, where’d all the time go?
Quinn cleared the tears from his eyes as he watched the scene through the window dissolve into darkness.
He’s not dead. He’s just different. Happier. He still remembers three years of sliding with us.
He turned back to the bar, where Sam met his eye.
“So, you’ve figured a way out of this place, huh?” he asked, his face serene and seemingly unflappable.
Quinn nodded, still a little choked up, as Colin placed a hand on his shoulder.
“In theory,” Colin said. “This bar is not exactly adherent to the normal laws of the universe, is it?”
“Maybe not.” Sam glanced at the bartender, questioning.
“We’ve accounted for everything the gaggle of us could think of,” John said, leaning on the back of a chair as he faced them. “Nexus Quinn’s timer was really useful to study.”
He reached into his pocket, and produced a sleek new timer, that looked similar to his old handlink.
Quinn, finding his voice, pulled out his own, and showed it to Sam.
“Instead of relying on the current world’s coordinates as a focus point, like the old designs,” he explained, “we’ve placed a homing beacon on your world and on Earth Prime that should let us snap back to one of them at any time. And it doubles as a temporal stabiliser so the wormhole we open will always lead to our concurrent time, even if the vortex experiences the kind of issues that sent us to ’78.”
Sam nodded as he turned the timer over in his hand, grinning, and tapped a few controls.
“There’s a direct link to Higgins? You guys knocked it out of the park.” He looked at John as he gestured to Quinn and Colin. “These two showed you how to work on a shoestring budget, huh?”
John chuckled. “Felt like I was at college again. But they’re resourceful, that’s for sure.”
“We did get some resources from the Professor,” Quinn added. “But yes, we did raid a few junkyards.”
Sherri approached the group, curious. “They look like… handlinks.”
Sam inspected the touchscreen display. “To me, it looks like a cell phone, circa 2013.”
Quinn raised an eyebrow, not sure if he was kidding. His face didn’t give it away. Shaking his head, Quinn turned towards the bartender.
“You can control this stuff, can’t you?” he asked, eyes narrowed. “You will let us leave using these timers, right?”
The bartender looked up from the glass he was polishing. “Who, me?”
“Uh-huh,” continued Colin. “I don’t think our timer flashing zero when we first met Sam was a coincidence, was it?”
“It needed a tune-up, didn’t it?” the bartender offered.
Huh. So it really was this guy. I need to get my hands on the Reality Lens.
As Quinn eyed Colin’s pocket, the bartender shot a look at the clock, which was about to hit one in the morning.
“Folks, it’s closing time. You don’t have to go home, but…”
John met Quinn’s eye.
“Alright, everyone sliding out of here… it’s time.”
The bar sprang to life with movement. Will and Al Prime moved towards John, while Maggie stepped up beside Quinn.
Sherri moved to Sam, and scooped him into a hug.
“Bye, Uncle Sam…”
“Hold on just a moment, missy…” the bartender interjected. “I have one last task for you. Don’t worry, it’s an easy one.”
Sherri furrowed her brow. “What?”
The bartender winked. “Just hang back, okay? I promise you’ll be back home in no time.”
Sherri exchanged a look with John, and then Sam.
“I… think you can trust him,” said Colin out of the blue. Quinn glared at him, before aiming his timer.
“Let’s go.” He activated the vortex, startling everyone. Colin looked at him questioningly.
“Goodbye everyone,” Quinn said.
As Colin approached the wormhole, Quinn leaned forward, snatching the Reality Lens from Colin’s pocket, before shoving him into the swirling blue tunnel.
“Sorry, bro,” he said, as he opened the Lens and peered through it towards the bartender.
Oh.
He slowly lowered it, and nodded at Sherri. “Yeah, I think you’ll be okay. Well, gotta run. We’ll keep in touch.”
Waving at the bewildered people around him, he gave a wide grin, before stepping into the vortex.
* * *
Sam scratched his head as he watched Quinn disappear. What could he possibly have seen?
As Maggie gave rushed hugs to the two Sams, and jumped in after the brothers, Sam turned his attention back to the bartender, who was smiling. Of all the things he seemed to understand now, this man, who looked like ‘Weird Ernie’ from Edwards Air Force Base, was still a complete mystery; opaque to him.
The vortex closed up, leaving the bar windswept and silent.
“I guess that leaves us,” said John, gesturing to his entourage. He turned a worried eye to Sherri. “Look, you don’t have to do what he says…”
Sherri bit her lip. “For some reason, I have a funny feeling that I do.”
Sam stroked his chin as he realised that he, too, felt like this task – whatever it was – was a necessary one.
“It’s okay,” he said to his double. “She’ll be back in no time. Don’t ask how I know.”
John gave him a puzzled look.
“Alright then.” He placed a hand on Sherri’s arm. “Take care, Sherri.”
Sherri nodded. “Of course. I’ll see you soon.”
John smiled at Sam. “So, this is goodbye, huh?”
Sam opened his arms, inviting a hug. “Come on, then. No kissing this time.”
John chuckled as the two shared a warm embrace.
When it was over, Sam gave a nod towards Will. “He’s all yours.”
Finally, Al Prime approached Sam, looking him up and down with curiosity.
“So, you’re what coulda been if John had joined Starbright.”
“That I am.” Sam grinned, now intimately familiar with the friendship that this version of Al shared with his double. “But you two still managed to find each other, all the same. Maybe we’re soul mates.”
“Uh, sure,” Al raised an eyebrow. “If only John had a heftier set of…”
He mimed holding up something heavy.
“Doctorates?” finished Sam.
“Exactly.”
As Sam laughed, John’s wormhole opened up, and the three men bound for Earth Prime congregated in front of it.
The first to jump in was Will, clearly desperate to get out of here. Then Al Prime gave a short salute, followed by a nod towards his counterpart, and stepped in.
“Thanks for everything,” John murmured.
Sam smiled. “Take care of yourself. I’ll see you again.”
Sam knew that John knew that it was a promise he intended to keep.
As the vortex closed behind John, Sam gazed at the dwindling crowd around him. Sherri, Al, and the bartender were the last ones remaining.
“Guess I’d better skedaddle before I get stuck in here like the other me,” said Al, stamping out his cigar.
The bartender nodded, and gave a flourish towards the door. “Thank you for your patronage. Please come again.”
Sam approached him, and they hugged. The embrace lasted long enough that Sam sensed the bartender checking his watch.
“Don’t be a stranger,” Al said, poking a finger into Sam’s chest. “Or I’ll find some necromancer to resurrect Ziggy and hunt you down.”
“Al, you will see me again,” said Sam. “Count on it.”
And as Al drove away into the New Mexico desert, just two leapers and a strange barman remained.
The bartender locked the front door, before taking a seat at a table. He gestured for Sam and Sherri to come closer.
“The bar is closed,” he explained, “so I’m officially off-duty. Meaning…”
He gestured to his clothes. “I can change out of this getup.”
Sam’s jaw slackened as he watched the bartender’s appearance shimmer and shift into…
“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding.”
Sam burst into laughter as he laid eyes on an older version of himself. The older Sam looked to be in his sixties or seventies, with grey hair and deepset laugh lines.
“Are you serious? I’m God?”
Everything suddenly fell into sharp focus for Sam, as his own future became more and more accessible. And it occurred to him that, long ago, when the bartender said he was leaping himself around, it had been technically true.
The older Sam grinned up at the two shocked faces.
“Now you know why I laugh at the suggestion,” he said, shrugging.
Sam felt Sherri grab his arm, and her face rested on his shoulder. “God or not, this puts things into perspective.”
It certainly does.
Sam ran a hand through his hair, and he paced the room.
“I don’t know what to say,” he muttered. “I mean, it makes sense. All those times I thought God was being unfair to me… now all I have to blame is myself.”
He laughed, shaking his head, as Sherri stared at the older Sam, processing everything.
“So everything that’s happened…” she said quietly, “it was you. Bringing me to Earth Prime… John… the thing with the broken timer… even that crazy stuff with Tam?”
The older Sam nodded, his eyes warm and amiable. “It was a lot of legwork, but we all pulled it off.”
“Why all the smoke and mirrors?” Sam asked. “And how did you disguise yourself like that?”
“You like it? It’s a trick I picked up from one of the less bloodthirsty Kromaggs.” The older Sam chuckled. “As for why?”
He crossed his arms. “Would you have done all this if you didn’t think it was God? If you knew it was just you?”
Sam’s shoulders slumped. No, probably not.
“Now, Sherri,” continued the older Sam, “You’ve got something to do that you’ve been putting off for twenty-five years. You ready?”
Sherri tilted her head, and seemed to understand. “Yeah. I think I’m ready.”
She grabbed Sam’s hand, squeezing it. “See you round, Uncle Sam.”
“Enjoy your retirement,” he said with a wink.
And she leaped away.
Sam took a seat across from his older self. “So what happens now?”
“Got a special assignment for you.” The older Sam leaned forward. “There’s a newbie waiting to be shown the ropes. Up to it?”
As the words were spoken, Sam already understood what he had to do.
“Let’s do it.”
Sam didn’t need anyone to help him leap this time.
* * *
Quinn had woken this morning from a really strange dream, but the details were pretty hazy. One thing he did remember, however, was that within the dream, he’d had a son named Cory.
Which was interesting, since he’d awoken to a Stephanie who hadn’t yet given birth to their baby.
And he was having some mega déjà vu, too. For example, the date he saw on the morning paper was the very date he remembered to be Cory’s birth date.
Lo and behold, he was now holding Stephanie’s hand at her hospital bedside, as she breathed through another contraction.
“Can you get me…” Stephanie said, before grimacing for a moment. “Can… you get me… a candy bar or something…? I’m famished.”
Quinn gave her hand a squeeze before letting go. “Sure, babe.”
He strode out of the room, still feeling an eerie sensation, like all this had happened before.
Wade is about to come around this corner.
And there she was, hurrying into the hospital, and spotting him.
“Hey! Steph doing okay?”
“Yeah, she’s doing great,” said Quinn, scratching his head. “She’s still got a couple hours ’til the delivery…”
How would I know that?
He shook his head. “I’m just getting her a snack.”
Wade grinned. “Do you need a snack, too?”
Quinn’s eyes widened as he glanced around the hospital. “It’s a little public, don’t you think…”
Wade bit her lip. “I’m just gonna go in the bathroom. Maybe I’ll see you there in a minute?”
She winked, and headed towards the restrooms.
Quinn retrieved the chocolate bar from the vending machine, and wandered towards the door Wade had conspicuously left unlocked. He glanced around before scrambling inside.
“This feels wrong,” he murmured between kisses. “My wife’s literally having my baby…”
“I know. It feels so… so wrong…” Wade said, unbuttoning his shirt. “You’re such a bad boy…”
Oh, what the hey.
He grabbed at her shirt, pulling it off, and they shared another passionate kiss, and his eyes fell shut as he tasted her lips.
Then a strange electrical sensation against his skin made his eyes pop open. He felt a frantic shove as he bumped back against the wall, and he realised he was no longer looking at Wade. His jaw dropped, and panic rose in his chest.
“Oh, come on, how many more guys am I gonna have to kiss today?” said the man, wiping at his mouth in disdain. “Sorry to drop in on you like this, Quinn.”
Quinn squinted in confusion at this man that looked somehow familiar. “Do I know you?”
The man sighed. “Yeah, but it looks like I’m gonna need to jog your memory a bit. Sam Beckett.”
He held a hand out. Quinn didn’t make a move to shake, opting instead to stare and try to convince himself this wasn’t happening.
Sam pointed to the mirror, and Quinn saw the man’s reflection was of Wade. His eyes darted back and forth, and his knees became weak.
“I have a few things to explain,” said Sam, “but the first may be the toughest to swallow. See… you kinda… died. But you’ve got a chance to put a few things right before you ride off into the sunset. And I’m here to help you.”
I get it, I’m still dreaming. That must be it.
Sam peered into the mirror at his feminine reflection. “Given that you’re making out with a mistress while your wife’s giving birth in the other room, I’ll give you one guess what you and me are here to do...”
“Oh boy…”
* * *
Sherri took a step back as she felt the prickling leaping sensation pass through her.
Where am I this time?
But it seemed the answer was right in front of her. She stood on a familiar sidewalk, in front of a familiar diner. And in the glass, her reflection looked back at her with two familiar eyes. Her own two eyes. And beyond her reflection, within the diner, she spotted three familiar figures.
She realised, then, what she was here to do. Confidently, she stepped into the diner, the bell on the door jingling, and approached two young Maggies sipping black coffee in front of Colin.
She grinned as the Maggies, one dressed in a Sheriff’s uniform, looked at her with disbelief.
“Ah, girls, I was hoping you’d be here.”
One Year Later
It was a warm morning. Colin was already wiping sweat from his brow as he emerged from his bedroom to join Quinn and their birth parents for breakfast. The floor-to-ceiling windows of the apartment gave striking views of the technologically advanced city that surrounded them, but they were also letting in the searing sun.
Colin punched in a setting on a control panel on the wall, and the windows darkened a little, dampening the harsh heat.
No sooner than he came into view of Quinn, did his brother launch their timer towards him, leaving him scrambling to catch it.
“You’re not delicate with this thing, are you?” he asked, noting the various cracks on the screen.
Quinn shrugged. “Just look at the message.”
Colin glanced down at it, and turned on the display. On it was a message he and Quinn had been hoping to see for some time.
“Nice!” he announced, passing the device back to Quinn. “A year to the day, huh?”
“Has it been a year already?” asked Maggie, coming up behind Colin, and peering at the timer. Colin nodded, as she continued to the breakfast table, leaning over Quinn and giving him a peck on the cheek.
“If you three are going to Earth Prime,” said Elizabeth Mallory, “could you bring me back some of those fruits I like? What are they called again… ‘bonobos?’”
“Bananas, Ma,” Quinn said, suppressing a laugh. “I’ll try and make sure I don’t land on ’em this time.”
“Thank you, honey.”
Quinn wolfed down his cereal and Maggie stuffed a piece of toast into her mouth, as Colin grabbed an apple to go, and the trio bid goodbye to Elizabeth and Michael Mallory, bound for Earth Prime.
* * *
Professor Maximillian Arturo emerged from the lift, striding into Project Long Jump with purpose.
As he walked past the various staff, each greeted him with a cheerful nod. Feeling in high spirits, he approached his son, placing a hand on his shoulder as he worked at his multi-screened terminal.
Will turned around, startled. “Oh, hi Dad.”
“I trust you’ve notified the off-worlders about the transmission Higgins received, William?”
Will smirked. “Of course.”
“Wonderful,” said Arturo, rubbing his hands together. “This time, I plan on seeing the anomaly for myself.”
Will cringed. “I’m not sure I’m game to go back there.”
Arturo scoffed. “William, take some initiative for once in your life! Nothing ventured…”
“Nothing gained…” Will said, sighing.
“That’s the spirit! Now, have you seen Mister Mallory?”
“Which one?” asked Will.
Arturo chuckled, as he realised that the iterations of his various companions were beginning to get a sight convoluted.
“Alpha,” he said, stroking his beard.
Within the Higgins system, they had decided to designate known doubles with unique numeric signifiers based on their home world coordinates – aside from Nexus Quinn, who had been so named for his pivotal role in a plethora of Earths. However, since the discovery of the temporal paradox doubles of his friends, it had become necessary to differentiate the branched offshoots of the very people he knew from Earth Prime.
Thus, they had decided to designate those who had not experienced the invasion of Earth Prime as ‘Alpha’ (α) and those who had as ‘Omega’ (Ω). It had seemed like the fairest categorisation that wouldn’t have deemed one more ‘original’ than the other.
Will pointed to a door across the room. “Over in the server room.”
“Jolly good,” Arturo chirped, and headed towards the door. As he walked, a chime from Higgins sounded over the intercom.
Ah, excellent timing.
Arturo changed his direction, and headed for a door on the opposite side of the room. He opened it to find a wormhole opening, and three sliders tumbling out.
“Good morning,” he said, as QuinnΩ, MaggieΩ, and Colin climbed to their feet.
“Mornin’,” said Quinn, brushing himself off.
“Mister Mallory, I shall let your counterpart know that he should adjust the entrance velocity parameters in the homing beacon. You came out of that one rather roughly, didn’t you?”
Quinn’s face lit up. “Oh, is he here? I have some probability readings from Earth 820H to go through with him.”
“He is indeed. I heard he was in the server room.”
“Great!”
Quinn dashed off to see his double, as Colin watched. The younger Mallory brother then turned his attention to Arturo.
“How are things ’round here, anyway?”
“Positively humming along.” Arturo turned to head back to the main area of the facility. “We’ve had more technological breakthroughs in this facility alone than any other university in the world for the past four years. I daresay John, Mister Mallory and I are collecting Nobel prizes at the rate I used to collect top pupil awards as a lad.”
“That’s awesome,” Colin remarked. “I’d say I’m jealous, but I live on an Earth that’s decades ahead of any other one I’ve seen, so I can’t complain.”
As they approached the main floor, the pair of Quinns burst out of the server room, with a giggling Wade Welles being piggy-backed by QuinnΩ. Quinnα launched himself at Colin, pulling him into the kind of unrestrained, semi-violent hug only a close sibling could get away with.
“How you been, bro?”
Colin laughed as the hug turned into more of a headlock. “Oh, you know. Chewing gum, kicking ass. The usual.”
Arturo stood back, watching the youthful exuberance with a smile.
Wade climbed off QuinnΩ, and sauntered up to Maggie.
“What are you doing down here?” Maggie asked, looking her up and down.
“I work here now,” she said in a terse tone. “I happen to be pretty good with computers, and I’m training to be Will’s relief. Turns out he’s been putting in fourteen hour days for like eight years.”
Maggie processed this for a moment, before grinning. “Sounds like my sister’s gonna be in good hands when she makes her first leap.”
Wade returned the grin. “She’s in the gym right now, if you want to lose a sparring match to her.”
Maggie flexed her bicep. “Hey, I’ve been training too.”
“Take it up with her,” said Wade with a shrug. “I heard she whooped your ass last time.”
“Yeah, well, Sherri still ran circles around the both of us.”
“She certainly did,” Arturo chimed in. “Now, Miss Welles, if you keep flapping your gums like a gossiping wife instead of getting back to work, the next person you’ll be chit-chatting with is the lady at the unemployment office. You have much left to learn, so do toddle off.”
Wade rolled her eyes. “I forgot how much of a grouch you are.”
She leaned in towards MaggieΩ, whispering. “He’s all bark and no bite. I know he loves having me around.”
She is right, of course. But she’ll never catch me admitting to it.
Wade headed over to Will, where she sat beside him, peering up at the screens.
“So, where are John and Sherri?” Colin asked, finally getting to the question Arturo had been anticipating.
“Presently, they’re off-world. I believe they are seeing one Doctor Beeks.”
QuinnΩ grinned. “Really? Finally. When will they be back?”
“John insisted that he would meet us at the anomaly.”
“Speaking of which,” Quinnα added, “I may have roped Remy into coming. Told him it was a gig.”
“He doesn’t remember anything, does he?” QuinnΩ asked.
“Nope, didn’t think it was my place to say anything, either. I’ll let the Omegas take the lead on explaining all that.”
QuinnΩ took a deep breath. “It’s not gonna be easy, but thanks.”
* * *
Colin knocked on the door of his former home, as QuinnΩ stood further back, nervously shifting on his feet. As the door opened, Missus Mallory’s mouth broke out in a wide smile.
“Colin!” she cried, grabbing his face and showering it with motherly kisses, as Colin awkwardly laughed.
“Hi, Ma. Good to see you, too.”
“You really need to visit more,” she said, looking him up and down. “Your hair is looking a bit scruffy. I’ll get your father to book you in with his barber.”
“Hey, Mom,” said QuinnΩ, waving.
Missus Mallory leaned to one side to look beyond Colin, and smiled.
“Quinn, you’ve brought me quite the surprise today.”
“Oh, I have one more up my sleeve,” QuinnΩ said, face flushing. He turned, and beckoned over Quinnα, who was lingering at the bottom of the porch stairs. He trotted up the steps, and the two Quinns each gave her a sheepish grin.
Missus Mallory squinted at the pair.
“Oh no, not more of these parallel world doubles,” she said. “They give me a headache. Which one of you is my son?”
“Uh, that’s the thing,” said Quinnα, “we kind of… both are.”
“We’ve been, uh, sharing our role with you for about a year now,” QuinnΩ explained, “but we thought it might be time to give you the whole story.”
Missus Mallory rubbed her temples. “Oh, this is going to be more of a migraine, isn’t it?”
She stepped back, gesturing inside. “Come on in, then. I’ll put on some tea and take an aspirin.”
As the three entered, she called down to the basement. “Michael! The boys are here, and they’ve multiplied, apparently!”
* * *
“Well John, I think we’ve made some breakthroughs today,” Verbena said as she set down her notepad.
John stood from the psychiatrist couch, stretching. “Doesn’t feel as rewarding as a scientific breakthrough, I gotta say.”
“Regardless, I’m sure you’ll be seeing the benefits of your treatment in no time.”
“If you say so. Thanks.”
Verbena smiled. “I hear there’s another birthday party tonight at the… um, roadhouse.”
“That’s what Higgins told us,” John said. “You coming?”
“Oh, I don’t know…”
“Come on, you’re one of the team. I’m sure everyone’ll be delighted to see you.”
“Well, I’ll think about it.”
John nodded, and headed for the door. “Hope to see you. I know it’s a little weird, willingly stepping into what we can only describe as a pocket dimension. But I think all the kidnapping is over now, for what it’s worth.”
He left her with that thought, as he strode away from the Albuquerque office, and joined Sherri in a nearby park. Sammy Jo was sitting with her, tapping at a handheld device.
“Okay, the calibration is almost complete,” she mumbled, head down. “How’s… that?”
Sherri blinked a few times, moving her new bionic eye back and forth.
“Wow, this eye is so much clearer than my old one. Can I just replace both my eyes with these things?”
John chuckled as he looked down at the glass-coated robotic eye, which looked very nearly the same as her natural one.
“I wouldn’t do that until we’re out of beta phase,” he said, before giving Sammy Jo a pat on the back.
“It looks great, Sammy. I think you’re gonna be the next Beckett featured in Time Magazine. Sam is yesterday’s news.”
Sammy Jo grinned up at him. “Thanks for your help.”
Sherri stood from the park bench with renewed energy. “Alright, we’ve got a drive ahead of us. Let’s get something to eat before we bounce.”
* * *
Sam whistled as he wiped down tables in his relatively new home, named for his best friend.
It had taken him a few years to carve out this little space beyond time, but it had been a necessary step in the life that stretched out before him, both full of possibilities, and somehow already known to him in some strange way.
But he was almost ready to open this place for his first annual birthday event; why visit everyone separately when he could bring them to him?
He moved to the kitchen door, and peeked inside, where a fifty-five year old woman put the finishing touches on a sheet cake.
“How’s it feel to be catering a party you already attended?” he asked her, grinning.
Donna glanced up at him. “Awkward enough that I intend to stay upstairs until it’s over.”
Sam moved behind her, and wrapped his arms around her waist, kissing her tied-back hair that smelled of citrus.
“Okay, but you’ve got to make an appearance next year, because by then everyone will think you’re missing.”
Donna nodded. “Fine. Now if you don’t mind, I need to finish this.”
She looked back at him with a grin. “I hope you have a lovely night with your friends.”
Sam headed back out into the bar, and peered out the window at the bustling Kearney Street of San Francisco. Reflected in the glass was the face of Al the Bartender — or Weird Ernie, as the case may have been.
“Alright,” he muttered, flipping the ‘Closed’ sign. “Al’s Place is officially open for business.”
As he unlocked the door, he grinned as he spotted a flustered Rembrandt Brown loaded up with portable musical gear. Sam pulled open the door.
“Funny, I never seen this place open before,” Rembrandt mumbled, as he struggled to lug the equipment through the door, and glanced around. “Though I’m sure I’ve been in here.”
“Welcome to my establishment, Mister Brown,” Sam said with a smile. “I’m a big fan. Do you need a hand with that?”
Thank you so much for reading. I hope you liked this ridiculous labour of love. And even if you didn't, it doesn't matter 'cause it's not canon anyway!
Thank you so much for reading. I hope you liked this ridiculous labour of love. And even if you didn't, it doesn't matter 'cause it's not canon anyway!
If you'd like, you can check out Quinntum Leap on Archive of Our Own and give a Kudos or leave a comment on one/all of the parts.
If you wish to get in touch with me, head over to my website, ashe.link, which contains all my relevant social media links.