7.10  ·  Party Favours

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.