Chapter Text
If there was one thing Sam learned over his years in the leaping business, it was to expect the unexpected. Nevertheless, he always ended up swiss cheesing that rule somehow, and so he’d been pleasantly blindsided to find himself suddenly leaping with his best friend. And considering that he’d cut off contact with the Project and resigned himself to a life of solitary leaping, it was a stunning—but welcome—turn of events.
Al was here, with him, traveling through history to put right what once went wrong. And for the first time in a long while...the last leap had ended with Sam feeling confident that the wrong had been put right. For the first time in a long while…he felt truly, genuinely happy. Ages had gone by trapped in a nebulous, uncertain void; now it felt pure. It felt...damn good. Before this, he’d begun to wander off the path.
Leave it to Al to set him back on course.
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If there was one thing Al learned over his handful of days in the leaping business, it was that making rash decisions can put you in some hot water. Like stranding yourself in time with no contact to your present, for a very specific instance. You’d think he would’ve caught on to something from Sam in that department. But as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained--and finding Sam was a big, fat gain.
So Mission 1: accomplished. Mission 2: …well, he’d figure out Mission 2 later. For now, he was just glad to have his best friend back. And hey, helping three runaways ain’t a bad bonus. Say, that was one more thing he remembered! Out of all the side effects of leaping, swiss cheesing was his least favorite, so he was grateful for whatever stayed in his noggin. They’d done a good deed. Maybe, possibly, by some small percentage, he could get the hang of this leaping thing.
Hey, if Sam Beckett could do it, so could Al Calavicci.
-------
Something wriggled in Sam’s hands. Curious. As he blinked away the remaining light from the leap, his vision cleared and gave him full view of the green snake between his fingers.
“AAHHH!” Sam’s hands snapped open faster than a cork stopper; he reeled back into a confused Al behind him.
“What? What is—AAHHH!” Al’s eyes bugged out when he saw the animal slithering away, jumping fearfully and landing with a splat. He wasn’t a fan of snakes either. “Oh, wh—Ahhh, look at this, Sam!” Nose crinkled with distaste, he examined the dung now covering his already muddy boots. “Not again! Yuck!” Hadn’t he stepped in enough crap the last leap?
But Sam was no longer paying attention. While the older Italian cursed his rotten luck and tried to scrape off his shoes on a tree trunk, a sparkle in the brush caught the scientist’s eye. Stooping down next to it, he pulled away the greenery and his face lit up in awe.
“Al.”
“Now I’m gonna stink all—what?”
“Come look at this.”
Begrudgingly, Al trudged over. “Sam, did you see what I stepped in? I—“ But his jaw went slack and his annoyance vanished. “Wowza…”
The glimmer--caked with spots of dried mud, but still shining brightly--was a large golden cup, engraved with an intricate design and embellished in turquoise. The two of them could only stare in amazement.
“Oh boy…” they breathed.
“What is it?” Al at last asked with interest, “Gee, that’s gotta be worth a few smackeroos…”
Carefully scooping up the sublime find, Sam discovered the cup had surprising heft to it. It was definitely solid gold, not overlaid. Al’s assessment of it being worth a few “smackeroos” was correct. “It’s a cup. Maybe South American…?” Sam deduced, fingers stroking gingerly across the design. He took note of the jungle around them. Had they leaped outside of the States?
“That looks pretty old, Sam.”
“A few hundred years, at least. Here, see for yourself.” Handing the cup to an awestruck Al, Sam stood up to survey their surroundings. “So question is...when are we now?”
Following his lead, Al got to his feet and squinted at the trees. “For all this place tells us, we could be in the Jurassic Period.”
“I have a feeling we didn’t leap back that far.”
“Well you just whistle if you see any dinosaurs runnin’ around.”
“Hey, there’s our things,” Sam told him, spotting a couple of large packs nearby, “This should give us some clues.”
The unwieldy packs were full of trekking gear and other supplies, mostly dateless save for a tin first aid kit that indicated the 40s or 50s by its design. And some notes. Scribbled in difficult to read writing, Sam spied a date on top: “May 12th, 19…” He pulled the paper closer. “1952.” He looked up curiously. “That’s before I was born. That must mean we’re following your lifetime too.”
“Say, that’s right…” Hovering over his shoulder, Al was distracted by the horrible handwriting. “Jeez, who can read this chicken scratch? Hold on, that says somethin’ about snakes there…” He shuddered. “Man, I hope this leap has nothin’ to do with snakes. I hate snakes.”
“Señors.”
“AH!” Both of them spun around with a start at the sudden third voice.
The gangly Hispanic man flashed them a strange look, but he moved on without comment. “It’s getting dark,” he said, jerking his head back, “We should return to camp.”
“Camp. Yeah…” Sam agreed uncertainly, hoping for him to take the reigns.
“Lead the way,” Al suggested to the man, gesturing ahead. Again they received an odd look, but the man went forward. Sam cast a grateful glance toward Al as they picked up their heavy packs.
“I’d suggest you hurry,” the man said, “You don’t want to be lost at night in the Llanganates.” And he continued into the trees.
Al buckled his straps faster, and Sam nearly choked.
“…dmiral Calavicci.”
A slight twinge behind his eye. Al’s head whipped to the right. There in the trees, sticking out like a sore thumb, was a figure in a white lab coat.
“Al!”
The urgent whisper distracted Al for a moment, and when he looked back the figure was gone. Huh. Must be his imagination acting up. He coulda swore someone was there though. But who would be out here in a lab coat?
“Hey!” Sam whispered more insistently, “Did you hear what he said? The Llanganates!”
“So? That and a dime will get you a cup of coffee.”
“Al…” Sam leaned in pressingly, clamping his hand on his arm. “This is where the Incas supposedly hid their gold. That cup we found could be part of a lost treasure!”
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“A lost Inca treasure?” Al’s voice was laced with disbelief, his eyelids half closed.
Pacing the tent with giddy excitement, Sam told the story without missing a beat. “In the 16th century, when the conquistadors invaded this region, the Inca offered them a roomful of gold artifacts in exchange for their captured emperor. But when they discovered he was killed, the legend says they hid the treasure somewhere in these mountains. A treasure that would include something like this.” Barely containing his fervor, he proudly raised the gold cup.
“But you said it was a legend,” Al pointed out dryly.
“Well...the details about how much gold there was vary,” Sam admitted, “but the existence of the gold was documented, and the consensus is that something was hidden.”
“And you think that cup could be part of it?”
“Why not?”
Al’s eyes slid so far to the side that they were in danger of drifting away. “Because it sounds like a load. Think about it, if a giant treasure trove of gold were hidden out here, don’t you think after 400 years someone would’ve found it?”
“Have you seen where we are? The Amazon is a huge place! Besides…” Sam shrugged nonchalantly. “...maybe that’s what we leaped here for.”
“Get real, Sam.”
“C’mon, Al. Where’s your sense of adventure?” He spread out his hands grandly, and Al waved him away. “Why’re you so skeptical all of a sudden anyway? I thought you believed in legends and myths. What about the mummy’s curse?” The last question accused with his own skepticism.
“A curse is one thing, but a lost treasure?” Al shook his head; this was all very silly. “It’s a bunch of Indiana Jones baloney, Sam. We live in the real world. Besides, since when do you want to strike it rich? It’s not like it’ll matter when we leap out.”
Sam’s face scrunched up with confusion. “Who cares about getting rich? Do you realize what a significant find this would be? We’d make history!”
Of course that’s what was on his mind. Al should’ve known better. Sam always had a fascination with archaeological discoveries; it tied into his love of history. Although...if Al thought about it purely from a monetary perspective, he supposed he could see the appeal. He couldn’t fault Sam for wanting to believe. Finally loosening up, he cautioned with a soft snort, “I appreciate the enthusiasm, but I wouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket with this one. What’re you doing?”
Already distracted, Sam was leafing through some papers they’d found inside the tent. “Looking for more clues about who we are…” Keeping his eyes on the writing, he handed a small portion of his stack to Al, who automatically took them for his own perusal. “Whoever wrote these notes signed them Edward Cooper…”
“Yeah, and there’s somethin’ here about two other people on this expedition...” Al said, bringing the paper closer, “...his brother Robert and someone named Barry Butler.”
“It looks like he’s cataloging the animals. He must be a zoologist,” Sam concluded.
Al sighed with relief and put a hand over his stomach. “Good, it’s not just snakes.”
“And I’m willing to bet the one holding the snake is the zoologist, so that’d make me Edward.”
“So who am I, Bobby or Barry?”
“Bobby! Eddie!” The two of them straightened up at the sound of a new voice. "You gonna stay in there all night?”
After exchanging a look, Sam said, “Guess that answers our question.”
-------
Outside, they were greeted by someone dressed in similar khakis, a handsome gentleman whose dimpled chin was broken up by a prominent scar--the only imperfection in his features. He'd set up a tiny fold-out table near the freshly started fire and was pouring himself a drink. Crow’s feet crinkled jovially around his baby blue eyes when he spotted them and raised his cup. “Nice of you to join me!”
“Hi, uh, Barry,” Sam replied as they joined him by the table. They politely declined when he offered the bottle to them.
“God, this place is beautiful.” Barry gazed at the plant life around them, the greenery flickering in and out in the crackling firelight. “I’ve spent the entire day mapping and it seems I’ve covered nothing at all. I could stay here another month and barely go over a fraction of the area.” He took a generous gulp of his drink.
Then and there, Sam decided he liked him. Right down to a T, he had the appearance of a rogue adventurer he’d imagined in one of those novels he read as a kid. He was handsome, but he had hands that were calloused and dirty, hands that weren’t afraid to do some work. His healthy appreciation of the beauty around them endeared Sam to him. Sam compared this to Al, who would likely much rather be in Vegas.
“How did you fare today?”
Sam and Al shared a look, wondering if they should divulge their discovery to the other man. Al shrugged. What did they have to lose? “Well…we found something,” Sam admitted. Darting quickly back into the tent, he reemerged with the cup in tow. Upon the reveal, Barry straightened up in astonishment. “What do you think?”
Nearby, the man who had led them back and a second guide also took notice.
“Damn!” Barry bent closer, his nose inches from the gold. “Do you realize what this could be?”
“Part of a lost Inca treasure?” Al provided, only slightly sarcastic.
“You read my mind, Bobby!” Barry said with a grin, “Gentlemen, we could be looking at a piece of history. Question is….what do we do with it?”
Sam’s lip slowly curled, caught up in the thrilling possibilities. He leaned forward, making an executive leap decision, “Tomorrow we go treasure hunting.” He felt in his heart that’s what they were there for.
Responding with an uproarious laugh, their companion proclaimed, “I’ll drink to that!” He raised his own cup, and Sam clinked the artifact against it in a toast. After another swig, Barry clapped his arms around them in excitement. Even Al was catching their enthusiasm.
Except, not entirely. There was something pensive about him, some distracting thought that removed him a bit from the situation...but it had nothing to do with his skepticism about the gold and Sam’s laser focus on it.
Leaping was a hell of a thing to get used to already, as it was much different than simply Observing. Leaping was getting into the thick of it, stepping into someone’s shoes and mucking around with their life. That was a lot of responsibility! It also meant a more emotionally and physically demanding role, something which he wasn’t sure he was prepared for. But he knew it was better than just before he stepped into the Accelerator. Here, he had Sam. He could see him, touch him, protect him from his own stupid self. Here, he was…well, he was happy.
But he was also remembering. More, that is. Those hazy little details from before, becoming sharper in focus. Resurfacing moments previously lost from his life, but most importantly from his last days at home. Which, well, wasn’t entirely unknown to him, but now he knew exactly what Sam had said and did, why he was feeling so lonely and confused and then hurt. The echoes of his feet in empty Project hallways, the bitter taste of a long since smoked cigar lingering on his lips. The sadness that he could’ve done something to stop him, if only Sam had trusted him enough to let him know.
Oh! But then…wowie, he’d found him! He sure had. He’d set out to do it, and he did, and that was no small feat. Yep. Those empty days were over. And now, uh…now there was this.
And, as he assured himself, he was happy.
-------
“Fred! Fred, stay with me! Someone call 9-1-1!”
The frail older man seemed even more fragile in Sam’s arms, his pale face contorted in pain. But moments ago he’d suffered a massive heart attack; there was nothing that could be done for him unless he—until he made it to the hospital.
“Please hold on,” Sam pleaded. His pulse was weak. “You’re going to be okay, just hold on.”
He’d thought he’d been here for his leapee’s daughter. She fit the profile: a troubled youth, combative, possibly into drugs. The most logical reason for the leap would be to set her on the right track, save her from herself. Without anyone to guide him, he made his most educated guess--a system which had so far been successful, even if just barely. He hadn’t so much as spared a passing thought to his kind old co-worker at the convenience store, a quiet man who kept to himself. To Sam, he had seemed at the time utterly irrelevant.
And now he was dead.
Devastation overcame Sam. What good was he? How could he trust himself to save anyone when he didn’t have the answers? What right did he have to be there in the first place?
Sam had failed.
Breath burst into his lungs and he awoke with a start. He was back in Ecuador in 1952. The present reality returning to him, he sighed calmly and laid down again. He hadn’t thought about that leap since…well, he didn’t know how long he’d been on his own, but sometime before Al had come into the picture. Some leaps he remembered it, others he didn’t. Always he felt the guilt. There must’ve been other incidents too, if the holes in his mind allowed it. He was glad they didn’t this time.
But things were different now. With Al by his side, he wouldn’t make those kinds of mistakes.
-------
A loud, exhausted sigh. Sam could see Al trailing behind him and Barry, struggling with the overlarge pack he was carrying. Up ahead, their guides (they’d learned their names were Ivan and Santiago) were leading them back to the area where the cup had been found. They were all slightly overprepared, just in case they found something and decided to stay overnight. So they had some basic supplies to hold them over, but unfortunately that meant extra weight to carry. And though Al would never say anything and give away his age, he was in his 60s, and definitely not in the same shape as the other men. And actually, Sam was finding the territory pretty strenuous too.
“Hey,” Sam called ahead, “let’s take a break, huh?”
The others agreed, their guides keeping to themselves while Barry traipsed to the river up ahead. Al cast a grateful look, tiredly seating himself on a large rock. “Thanks, Sam,” he gasped. He took a generous gulp from his canteen and wiped his mouth before requesting, “Next time we leap, let’s go somewhere with air conditioning, alright?”
“You won’t hear any arguing from me." Sam grinned, sitting close by and following Al’s actions. The two of them watched the river for a short time, listening to the sounds of the rainforest, with Al distant and adrift. An unspoken question hung in the air as thick as the humidity, and Sam elected to simply be upfront. “So what’s up with you?”
Al pulled at his sticky shirt to fan himself, stating obviously, “It’s hot, Sam.”
“You know what I mean. Something’s on your mind.”
A beat. Al’s eyes slid toward him hesitantly, and then he shrugged a single shoulder. “Well,” he sighed, “it’s, uh, it’s just…” A pause for thought. “I leaped to find you, Sam, and, uh, and I did. Which took a lot less time than I thought it would, to be honest…”
“And…?”
“And, well…now what?” Sam knitted his brows. Al met his confused gaze and shrugged again. “I mean, I didn’t exactly have a plan. I never really thought about what to do after I found you.” He scratched at his temple introspectively. “Just…putting my brain on the rack, that’s all.”
Sam understood. He frowned at the river, considering what the answer might be himself. What WAS the next step? Without the Project, how could they even attempt to go home? Before the return of Al to his life, he’d accepted the consequences of his rash actions. He’d made his bed, and he was going to lay in it. But now… “I…I guess we'll figure it out as we go.”
But Al wasn’t listening.
There was that voice again! It was unmistakable. Either he was losing his mind, or they were being followed. Come to think of it, he might’ve discovered their leap objective. The person in the lab coat could be...trying to steal the Cooper’s research? But...someone in 1952 wasn’t gonna be calling him by his real name, were they?
“Admiral Calavicci! Dr. Beckett!”
“Al? What is it?”
“Uh, it’s nothing.” More memories maybe? Another twinge. Jeez, get outta my head, will ya?
“Al.”
Sam was giving him a familiar look, one of those guilt trips where his mouth disappeared. Al hated those, but damn if they didn’t work. “Alright,” he relented, “I know this sounds bizarre, but yesterday I swear I saw—“
“Gooshie!” A stunned Sam scrambled to his feet, addressing someone behind Al.
With equal speed, Al was turned around and standing. And sure enough, there was the lab coat guy! So he was real! Al was relieved to have his sanity confirmed, but now he had a million more questions.
“That’s Gooshie?” he asked, unimpressed. He recalled the name, but not the face. The man was weaselly, but slightly pudgy at the same time; his unkempt mustache was just a little too long, and his hair a little too red. It reminded Al of his first wife. Wait, was his first wife a redhead? Maybe not that one. Of two things he was certain, however, but with no evidence to back them up: Gooshie smelled worse than he looked, and Al didn’t like him.
“Finally!” Gooshie sighed with relief and bent over, his fingers reaching down to his knees. “We’ve had a heck of a time finding you! It’s wonderful to see you, Admiral! And Dr. Beckett! Oh my god!” He gazed at Sam with similar surprise, his eyes bugging out. “We thought we’d lost you!”
“What’re you doing here?” gasped Sam, almost at a loss for words, as he circled the unsteadily flickering hologram, “How?! I thought the Project would be shut down by now!”
“They were,” Al provided, the empty Project again on his mind, “Or close to, at least, before I leapt.”
Gooshie confirmed this with a nod. “Absolutely, a-and that’s what saved it, Admiral!”
“Huh?”
“Well, the Committee was none too happy to find out that you’d taken an unauthorized leap, Weitzman in particular. He was furious!” Al didn’t remember who Weitzman was, but nonetheless, hearing that he’d made him angry gave him a warm, fuzzy feeling in his chest. Gooshie continued dutifully. “So, they immediately called us back to restart the program and retrieve you…” Then, nervously, “...for prosecution.”
“Ha!” The loud, uncontrolled laugh burst forth from Al instantly. They couldn't be for real.
Sam was too appalled to find the words; his face squished closer together the longer he thought about it. Suddenly, heroic sacrifices and searches across time and space were reduced to uptight, bureaucratic nonsense. His life’s work had become the tool of a government official with an axe to grind. “Wait a minute, you’re telling me the Project was brought back…to be petty?”
“It is a government project, Dr. Beckett,” Gooshie reminded him. Did that make Al’s actions more serious or the Committee pettier? “But once we saw two people in the Waiting Room, getting you home became part of the equation as well!”
Sam blinked. His leapee was appearing in the Waiting Room again? Had GTFW taken it upon themselves to reverse what he had done? That is…if he’d had any say in it to begin with. He wasn’t sure how he felt about this omnipotent intervention.
"It took us some time, but we were able to lock onto the Admiral's brainwaves using data from the Accelerator. That's why we've taken so long to find you." The handlink was retrieved from Gooshie’s pocket and he began to rapidly enter information. The rainbow block blipped and bleeped in response, and he read the screen. “Oh, Ziggy says hi.”
“Hi, Ziggy,” Sam sighed. He did miss her. “So can you?”
“Can I what?”
“Retrieve us.”
“Ummm…not as of yet, no.”
Sam deflated just a little bit. Microscopically, he’d gotten his hopes up.
Al was prepared for this answer; he knew how quickly the government worked. He wiped away a happy tear from his eye, still tickled. “Oh, I’m sure Weitzman was thrilled to hear that. That’ll make prosecuting me real easy.”
That raised a good question for Sam though. “Gooshie, if both Project Directors are here...who’s in charge back home?”
The two of them looked to the holographic programmer. Placing the handlink behind his back and gaining a touch more confidence, Gooshie smiled and bounced on the balls of his feet. “Dr. Fuller was put in command of the operations, Dr. Beckett.” But the others were drawing a blank. Neither of them knew who Dr. Fuller was. “Sammy Jo?” he offered, cringing a bit at having dared use someone’s first name.
This rung a bell. Sort of. “Ohhh…” both responded in unison, relieved. Neither of them had a clear recollection, but they remembered enough to consider her an acceptable choice. Recalling that Sammy Jo had worked on the retrieval program and was something of a genius herself, Sam grinned proudly. And for some reason he couldn’t place…he trusted her completely to run the Project in his absence. Why was that?
“A-And I’m temporarily serving as your Observer,” Gooshie added under his breath, almost as an aside, as he tipped his head low over the handlink, “until we can find a suitable replacement.”
A puzzling statement to Sam. “Why aren’t you suitable?”
“Me, Dr. Beckett?” Gooshie asked with surprise. He shook his head and giggled nervously. “Oh no, sir, I’m just filling in until someone more qualified comes along. I’m more of a…a behind the scenes person.” His confidence had dropped again; he buried himself in key-tapping.
Sam remembered Gooshie’s reluctance to leave the comfort of working on the parallel hybrid computer; half the time he was buried in one of Ziggy’s panels. He wasn’t unfriendly, simply…socially awkward. Although, Sam didn’t know a lot else about him because he was usually just a name Al was shouting. And depending on the day, Al either considered him a friend or hated his guts, so any information Sam received secondhand was a tad dubious. But next to Al, Gooshie was the best—actually, he was the only other Observer he’d had.
Al was not particularly concerned with Gooshie’s temporary position at the moment. “This is great!” he exclaimed to Sam, clapping a hand on his shoulder, “This means we have information from the future now! We won’t have to wing it!”
“Hey, that’s right,” Sam realized happily. Thoughts of the convenience store began to resurface...but he pushed them away and focused on the present.
He had guidance again.
"Do you know what we leaped here for?”
“Well let’s see…” The programmer was already plunking away at the handlink, pausing only to scratch at his mustache. Al noticed (a little jealously) that Ziggy didn’t protest nearly as much when Gooshie operated her. “It’s May 12th, 19—“
“1952,” Sam provided.
"That's right. You’re in the Llanganates Mountains in Ecuador, and you’ve leaped into—“
“Robert and Edward Cooper,” Al finished.
“Gee, you two seem to know everything already,” Gooshie said with wonder, his arms falling to his sides as the handlink blinked.
Sam rolled his hand impatiently. “The leap, Gooshie...?”
“Oh yeah.” Plink, blip, beep. The handlink's colors flashed brightly. “According to Ziggy, Edward Cooper, his brother Robert, and their friend Barry Butler started this expedition to document undiscovered parts of the Amazon. They arrived here three days ago, with the intention of returning to America two weeks later. Only…” He stopped and gulped, looking up at them with raised eyebrows. “...they never came back.”
“Why?” asked Sam, “What happened to them?”
Gooshie tried the handlink again. Ziggy was vocal as usual, but he shook his head. “I’m afraid there’s no data on that, Dr. Beckett. A couple search parties went out, but they didn’t have any luck. Their guides suspected they got lost from the campsite and couldn’t find their way back.” He nervously peered at the thick trees around them, imagining being trapped in there. “Ziggy gives it a 98.7% chance you two are here to get the party out of the jungle safely.”
“I’m sorry about what I said before, Sam,” Al stated, his mouth screwed up in concern, “Your treasure hunt is sounding pretty good right about now.”
“This should be easy then,” Sam said, confused at the simplicity, “All we have to do is cancel the expedition and have Gooshie lead us back. Right?” He looked to Gooshie for confirmation, who nodded amiably in agreement.
“That is, if nothing happens to us in the meantime…” Al pointed out from under the hand rubbing over his eye.
“But…”
“I don’t like ‘buts,’ Sam…”
Sam frowned. “If we leave, the lost gold might never be uncovered.”
“Lost gold?” Gooshie piped up curiously, “What lost gold? Am I missing something?”
“Saaaam,” groaned Al, tipping his head back, “someone else could come back for it later! You want us to end up stuck in the jungle forever?”
“Someone doesn’t come back for it! It was never found!”
“You know what else was never found? Us!”
Ignoring Al, Sam stepped closer to Gooshie. “Gooshie, does Ziggy have some way of scanning the area for a specific material? Like gold?”
“Errrr—no.”
“I coulda told you that, Sam.”
“Those artifacts are here,” Sam insisted, hand on his hip, "If we leave now, we’ll be abandoning one of the most monumental historical finds of this century.”
“I can see about configuring the handlink to scan for particular materials within a certain range…” Gooshie mused, stroking his chin. “It’d take some time, of course, and we’d need Committee approval.”
“We don’t have time!” Al shouted as he stamped his foot. Why wasn’t anyone listening? Boy, when Sam got an idea in his head, he stuck with it.
Sam squinted. “Since when do we need Committee approval for modifications to Ziggy? I’m approving it.”
“Heh, since Weitzman reinstated the Project. He’s a real stickler for rules.”
“Ugh, Weitzman,” Al said like he’d tasted something bad, temporarily forgetting his frustration with Sam, “He’s worse than Bartlett…” Hey, there was another name he remembered! He was getting pretty good at this.
“I have to say, Admiral, you’re a lot less swiss-cheesed than I thought you would be,” Gooshie noted, scratching at his head, “As I recall, when Dr. Beckett first leaped, he didn’t even know his name!”
“Well that’s thanks to Sam filling in a lot of the blanks for me,” Al said offhandedly, gesturing toward his friend, “Whatever he remembers in his own swiss-cheesed brain anyway…”
Gooshie froze. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
“Um, heh, what exactly did Dr. Beckett tell you?”
Al looked to Sam, both confused. “Y’know, things I might’ve forgotten. The Project, who he was, who I was….I was pretty swiss-cheesed last leap, but he helped jog my memory. It’s still a bit rusty, but it’s gettin’ there.”
If they’d just fused together and started speaking Latin, Gooshie’s expression would’ve made more sense. “You told him?” he asked Sam, incredulous, “B-But we’re not supposed to tell a leaper anything he doesn’t remember on his own!”
Sam shrugged. “I didn’t think that applied to other leapers.” Gooshie wasn’t convinced. He was starting to sweat as much as they were, and he was in the air-conditioned Imaging Chamber. “C’mon, Gooshie, it’s a stupid rule anyway. It wouldn’t be fair to leave him in the dark.”
“If you recall, Dr. Beckett, it was your rule.” Unheard by anyone but the programmer, he lifted his head to listen to a silent command. Swallowing nervously, he said, “Er—I have to go. They’re calling me back to…discuss this matter.”
“You’re not serious, are you?” Al’s mouth was agape. “I’d probably still be in the 70s if Sam hadn’t been there for me! Besides, I broke that rule all the time and nothing happened.”
“Like I said, Weitzman’s out for blood.” Gooshie opened up the Imaging Chamber, casting the dumbstruck men a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry. It’s not up to me. I’ll return as soon as I can.”
The door shut. Sam and Al stared at each other, stupefied.
“Ready to get going?” They jumped. They’d forgotten about Barry and their guides. Barry was watching them curiously, but must’ve assumed the animated conversation was something private between the brothers. “We’ve got a long day ahead.”