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Chapter Five
“Cold Dish of Revenge”
It was the middle of October. Things were starting to settle down at the Project. Al and Tina had had a quiet anniversary dinner together; they didn’t want a big fuss, and at the time Sam really wasn’t up for celebrating. Sam’s post-traumatic stress was getting better, although he still experienced the occasional nightmare. Cat had decided to take online courses, rather than return to college full-time, and was living on site with the others.
Sam had decided that he wouldn’t fully destroy the Accelerator, on the off-hand chance that he ever needed evidence that he’d actually succeeded in developing a way to travel in time. He still wasn’t keen on the idea of submitting his experiences to a scientific journal, but he was coming around to the idea of perhaps writing a paper as a cautionary tale. To that end he had developed a very complicated program that would prevent anyone from firing the Accelerator up in an attempt to use it. It had passwords, logic problems, mathematical equations and history questions that had to be answered correctly, and then the person would still need to state their intentions for using the Chamber and wait for Ziggy to contact Sam and for him to determine if the reason was good enough. It seemed the most fail-proof way to safeguard against it being used “accidentally” by anyone.
But, as the saying goes about man’s best-laid plans...
Maxine was actually enjoying her appointments with her shrink. Not something she’d ever thought she’d admit to, but this shrink was...different. In a very special way. Through her, Maxine had learned all about the top-secret project her ex-husband had been involved in. At first, she found the concept nearly impossible to grasp. But after her shrink had given her solid proof of the reality of it, she started wondering how she might use that information to her advantage.
She desperately wanted to get her daughter away from him. Mostly to hurt him, but also because she feared for Cat’s safety. If she really was living with him at this...project, then her life was in danger. At least, that’s what her shrink had told her.
The problem was there was no way for her to get to Cat. She wasn’t allowed any visitors, and her daughter had actually taken a restraining order out against her. At his insistence, of course. Cat would never do something like that on her own. He was trying to turn her daughter against her. The bastard. He wasn’t around her whole life, and now he was trying to be a father to her? Too little, too late. But there had to be a way for her to at least get a message to Cat, somehow to let her know she was at risk. She was young and impressionable. Maxine was her mother. They’d lived together all of Cat’s life. Well, except for the couple years Cat had lived with her stepfather. Another case of a man trying to manipulate her.
“So...did you ever run into anyone famous?” Cat asked. They were having their weekly “family dinner” in Al and Tina’s apartment. Cat had the idea late last month; she said since they were all family, it’d be nice to share a meal together once a week or so. Everyone had enthusiastically agreed, and they rotated who cooked and who hosted. Tonight Sammy Jo and Cat were on clean-up duty.
Al and Sam exchanged looks, and Al chuckled. “Oh, you could say that.”
“Really? Like...who?”
“Well...I kinda taught Michael Jackson how to moonwalk,” Sam admitted with an embarrassed look.
Sammy Jo laughed. “No way!”
“Yeah, I kinda did. I was...” He frowned briefly, trying to remember the details. “I was...Cam Wilson, this...pimply-faced teenager whose older sister was supposed to marry this...alcoholic brute...”
“Which is what you were there to prevent,” Cat assumed.
Sam nodded. “Right.” He paused briefly, as it dawned on him that during that particular Leap he remembered that his little sister Katie was going to marry an abusive alcoholic. Strange how sometimes things in his Leaps paralleled his personal life. “Anyway, we were doing the rehearsal dinner, and Al and I were in the men’s room...”
“That happened a lot,” Al complained, shaking his head. “Dunno whose bright idea it was to try carrying on a private conversation in a men’s room...”
“Anyway,” Sam cut in, getting back to his story. “This little boy came in, in this snazzy little show tux and...” He frowned again. “I don’t really remember how it started, but...we were doing some dance moves, and...one thing led to another and...well, the moonwalk was born.” He grinned and shook his head. “I had no clue who he was until one of his older brothers came in to get him. I think they were performing at the hotel or something.”
“Cool,” Sammy Jo said. “Anyone else?”
“He taught Chubby Checker how to do ‘The Twist’,” Al said with a chuckle. “That was fun.”
“You had some pretty wild dance moves, too,” Sam reminded. “In fact, he helped me out a lot when I had to dance.”
Sammy Jo and Cat both started giggling, trying to imagine the two of them dancing. “Wish I could’ve seen some of those moves,” Cat said.
“Be glad you didn’t,” Sam said, “or you’d lose all respect for me.”
“Like that would ever happen,” Sammy Jo denied, patting his hand and smiling at him.
“Oh, come on, Sammy,” Al objected. “You had some pretty smooth moves all on your own. Or don’t you remember dancing with that cute little waitress...what was her name?”
“Diana,” Sam said after some thought. “Right. I remember her. She was deaf, but if the bass was turned up high enough she could feel the music through the floor.” He smiled at the memory.
“Tell them about the time you were Doctor Ruth,” Tina requested.
Cat nearly choked on her wine. “W-wait....what?” she managed.
Al started to chuckle. “Ooh, that was a hoot! He actually climbed out the window of a taxi and started racing across all these cars caught in a New York traffic jam!” He looked over at Sam’s flushed face and started laughing.
Donna giggled. “I bet that was a sight!”
“It really was,” Al acknowledged with a grin.
“Hey, what else was I supposed to do? We were stuck in gridlock and I had to save Annie.”
“Who was Annie?” Sammy Jo wanted to know.
“This young secretary who was being sexually harassed by her boss,” Sam said. “I figured I was there for her, but Al and Ziggy thought I was there for Doug and Debbie, the announcer and producer of Doctor Ruth’s radio program.” He looked over at Al, whose smile faded when he caught the look. “But that wasn’t what I was actually there for.”
Al cleared his throat, and tried to change the subject. “He was Marilyn Monroe’s chauffer.”
Tina took his hand under the table and gave it a squeeze. “Honey, it’s ok. I’m glad you talked with her. It helped our relationship, didn’t it?”
Al shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Well...yeah. But...” He looked at Tina imploringly. “Do we really need to talk about it here? Now?”
Cat, realizing this was something her father was uncomfortable talking about, came to his rescue. “The real Marilyn Monroe? The gorgeous blonde sexpot?”
Sammy Jo raised an eyebrow; there seemed to be something other than awe in her friend’s voice. Sure, Marilyn was attractive...
“The one and only,” Al assured, grateful for her help. “Just before she filmed her last movie. Sammy got to see her in the pool.” He grinned at the memory.
Cat’s jaw dropped open and she blinked a few times. “She...she...swam in the nude.”
“She certainly did,” Al said, and sighed wistfully.
It was Sam’s turn to clear his throat. “Yeah...it was...something.”
“I’ll bet,” Cat lamented.
“He was Elvis,” Donna said, suddenly remembering.
“As in...the King of Rock-n-Roll?” Sammy Jo asked, looking at her father in amazement.
Sam nodded. “Yeah. Before he was even discovered, in fact.”
“Wow.”
Sam pushed back his chair and stood up. “You may go to college,” he started to sing, looking at Cat. “You may go to school/You may drive a pink Cadillac, but don’t you be nobody’s fool.” He backed further away from the table and started really getting into the song, moving like Elvis as he sang.
Tina leaned over to Al and said quietly, “I meant what I said, honey. I’m glad you had a chance to talk with Doctor Ruth. If not for her, who knows where our relationship would be now?”
He smiled tightly. “I know, Tina. It’s just...I get...uncomfortable, ya know?”
“Why? We’re all adults here. And it’s not like she gave you any...explicit sexual advice.”
Al chuckled. “Actually, I think I could’ve given her some advice.” He grinned and waggled his eyebrows, and Tina playfully swatted his arm. “It’s not that,” he went on, keeping his voice low so the others could enjoy Sam’s performance. “It’s just...” He sighed and shook his head. “We’ll talk about it later, ok? Let’s just listen to Sam. He doesn’t sing all that often.”
Tina frowned slightly, but then nodded. Something was on Al’s mind, but now was probably not the time to talk about it.
After Sam finished singing and sat back down, slightly out of breath, Cat asked, “What’s the furthest you ever went?”
Sam took a drink of water and asked, “You mean distance, or time?”
Cat raised an eyebrow. “Well...both, I guess.”
“Ended up in the Civil War,” Sam said, wiping the film of sweat off his face with his napkin. “That was...an experience.”
“Really threw Ziggy for a loop,” Al added, shaking his head.
“I bet.”
“Poor thing was in a complete state of panic,” Tina said. “And so were the rest of us, actually; Leaping not only out of his lifetime, but out of this century, defied all sorts of laws. At least, as far as we understood them. And...well, it...erased Sam. Temporarily.”
“So...how come he was able to do that? Leap outside of his life?” Cat asked.
“Well, apparently there was enough of a...match between Sam’s DNA and that of his great-grandfather, whom he’d Leapt into,” Donna explained, “and there was some kind of...genetic transfer.”
“Oh, wow,” Sammy Jo said quietly. She was reminded of something Cat had suggested a while ago, that Sam might be...carrying bits of the people he’d Leapt into, bits of their memories, or their personalities. She studied her father quietly, wondering if the symptoms Verbeena had diagnosed last month as being from PTSD might be something else entirely, something none of them had considered.
“And...the furthest away?” Cat questioned.
“Well, aside from Vietnam, the only two times I Leapt out of the country were when I was in Egypt, and the time I ended up in London.” He looked over at Al and made a cross with his index fingers.
Al rolled his eyes. “You never did look in the coffin,” he reminded.
Sammy Jo looked from one to the other. “Why do I have a feeling this is gonna be a doozy?”
“Al has a deep fear of vampires,” Sam explained, barely keeping a straight face. “He also doesn’t like crypts, dead bodies, tombs or mummies. Oh, or the Bermuda Triangle.”
“Hey. My aversion to dead bodies is perfectly normal,” Al complained. “There’s absolutely nothing attractive about a corpse.”
“I’m with Dad,” Cat put in. “The dead should remain dead.”
“Exactly.” Al turned to Sam. “You think you’re free?” he asked, his voice taking on a strange rasping quality. “You think you’re safe? You’re a fool! You don’t belong here, Sam Beckett. Your precious Admiral should be dead. And we’ll fix it. We’ll put things back the way they’re supposed to be. And there won’t be a thing you can do to stop it! Good doesn’t always triumph, you know.”
Sam stared at Al in shock. What in the world was he saying? That didn’t sound like him at all. It sounded like...
“Sam? Sammy?” Al waved a hand in front of Sam’s face, frowning in concern. “Where’d you go, buddy?”
Sam blinked slowly and shook his head, finally focusing on Al’s worried face. “What...did you just say?” he asked, fear choking his voice.
Al’s frown deepened. “I said, that Leap was creepy in the extreme, and I’ll never be comfortable in a castle again.”
“Oh.” Sam finished his water, hoping no one else noticed how badly his hand was trembling. Something very weird had just happened, but apparently he was the only one who’d noticed. He was tempted to say something, but he knew if he did they’d overreact. He didn’t want to worry any of them, Donna least of all. “Yeah. That...was a weird one,” he agreed.
Paranoia was her favorite tool to work with. Everyone had some degree of paranoia in them. The trick was finding it, and coaxing it out into the open to play with. So much damage could be done with a paranoid – destruction of property, mass shootings, suicide. You could reduce the bravest man to a whimpering little child if you played on his paranoia. You could turn the local soccer mom into an axe-wielding lunatic if you knew what to look for. Spouses could be turned against each other, businesses ruined, reputations destroyed, lives ended. It all depended on how good you were.
And she was very, very good. The best that they had. She’d tried to train Alia in the finer arts, but the girl had proven...weak. No matter. Her current...subject was a joy to work with. She had all sorts of fun fears to feed on. And the biggest one actually served her purpose the best.
As Donna and Tina helped Sammy Jo and Cat with the after-dinner clean-up, Al kicked back in his recliner, fingers laced over his stomach, eyes closed and a very self-satisfied smile on his face.
“Ahh. I could get used to this. Someone to do all my cooking and cleaning for me? Heaven.”
Sam came to sit on the couch next to him just as a dinner roll sailed in from the kitchen and hit him in the side of the head. “Yeah, and you’d turn into a giant blob,” Cat cracked.
Al opened his eyes and picked up the roll. “I’m in perfectly good shape,” he shot back.
“You’re right. Round is a shape,” Cat rejoined.
Al snorted, then threw the roll back into the kitchen, hitting her in the shoulder with it. “Don’t forget who won our last bout, missy,” he reminded. He’d been teaching her some basics of taekwondo, and she was picking it up fast.
“I let you win,” she replied with a smirk. “I didn’t want your ego as bruised as your butt was gonna be from falling on it.”
“Why...you...” Al pretended to be outraged and struggle from his chair.
“Caitlin, stop tormenting your father,” Tina admonished.
“But it’s fun!”
Al settled back into his chair with a chuckle. She was just teasing him, and he knew it. He was actually in better shape than he’d been in a long time, something which Tina had commented on just the other night...
“Do you think she went home?” Sam asked abruptly.
Al was thinking of other things, and wasn’t quite sure what Sam was asking. “Who?”
“Alia. Do you think...did she ever get back?”
Al sighed. “I dunno, Sam. We don’t know where she went, but we’re pretty sure she didn’t go back there. Why?”
“I...I just...I was...wondering.” He looked towards the kitchen, where they could hear the women talking and laughing. “She had to have gone...somewhere,” he said quietly.
“Well, yeah. But the question is...where?”
Sam nodded. “Was she...stuck forever in time? Like me? Or...did she...somehow go back home? Or...did I kill her?”
Al shook his head. “No way, Sam. Don’t even think like that. Alia’s safe. Or...she was.” When he saw the guilt start to creep across Sam’s face, he hurried on. “There’s no way she could have survived that lightning strike.”
Sam sat up, a sudden thought coming to him. “Unless...they could target their Leapers, right?” Al nodded slowly. “Well...she had to have targeted Gooshie somehow. So...what if...she managed to Leap out...”
“Just before the lightning struck,” Al finished. And the brief moment of hope faded as he realized. “Then...she just...used Gooshie, let him get killed, for what?”
“To save you,” Sam said.
Al didn’t like that idea one bit. “That was dumb of her.”
Sam frowned at him. “I don’t think it was.”
“C’mon, Sam. Gooshie was out of here. He had a life outside the Project. He’d moved on. Then all of a sudden someone else is living his life, making him sacrifice himself...for me?” Al shook his head angrily. “That was dumb.”
“Alia didn’t think so, or she wouldn’t have done it. Would you have preferred she just...picked some random person?”
Al opened his mouth to say something, but that’s as far as he got.
“She did what she had to do,” Tina said, standing next to him. She put her hand on his shoulder and looked down at him. “Gooshie, some random person...it doesn’t matter. She saved your life.”
Al looked up at his wife, and felt a mix of emotions start roiling through him. “She didn’t have to,” he protested. “Ziggy had a lock on Sam, the retrieval process had already begun. She...”
Tina put a finger against his lips. “Sam was coming home, Al. For the first time in ten years, he was going to be home. She couldn’t let his best friend die in order for that to happen.” She nodded at Sam. “How do you think he would’ve felt?”
Al sighed. He knew she was right. And he was truly grateful to be alive. It just seemed like the cost was a bit too high. He wasn’t exactly friends with the head programmer, at least not like he was with Sam, but that didn’t mean he wished him dead. (Even if he and Tina did have an affair.) But they’d done the same sort of thing before, chose one life to save over another. They did it because they thought it was the right thing to do, the way to...correct whatever wrong had happened. Alia had just done the same.
“They’re out there,” Sam said quietly.
“Who’s out where?” Tina asked with a frown.
“Them. The...other project. They’re...still out there. Somewhere.”
“You can’t know that, Sam,” Al denied.
“They are,” Sam stated with firm conviction. “They’re out there...and they want revenge.” His face was pale, his eyes wide with fear.
She was floating again. She didn’t know just where she was, but she did know that as long as she was...here, wherever it was, she was safe. They couldn’t reach her here. She couldn’t really remember who they were, but she knew they would hurt her if they ever found her. That much she knew with utter certainty. She just wished she was as sure of who she was, where she belonged.
Sometimes she had a name. Usually she could only remember her first name, and when she could remember it, she clung to that memory as the only sense of ‘self’ that she had. Because the disturbing thing was sometimes she was someone else. And she didn’t know how that could be possible. Something was wrong. Something...strange had happened to her, and sometimes she’d wake up as someone else. She’d live as that person for a while, then she’d...leave and end up back here. Wherever here was, she knew it wasn’t home. She had a vague memory of home, and whenever she thought about it she felt a strong yearning to return there.
“Are you ready?” the voice asked out of the nothingness that surrounded her.
“No,” she said, with a disappointed groan. “I want to stay here. It’s...safe here.”
“But you can’t. You have work to do,” the voice chided.
“Why? Why me? Why can’t I go home? I want to go home!”
“Not until your work is done.”
“Please. I don’t want to do it anymore. I want to be me again. Let me go home.”
“It has to be you. There’s no one else now.”
“But...there was,” she said, suddenly remembering. Not a name, but...a face. A very kind face. Someone she’d met once, someone...who had helped her get away from them.
“Yes. But his work is done now. He’s returned home.”
She was quiet a few moments, and then realized... “I took his place.”
“Yes.”
“I’ll never get home again, will I?” she asked with resignation.
“When your work is done. Eventually there will be another to take your place, and then you will be free to leave.”
She sighed in defeat. “What must I do?”
“Do you want to talk about it now?” Tina asked, as she got into bed.
Al frowned. “About...what?” He could barely keep his eyes open, and getting into any kind of discussion right now wasn’t high on his list of priorities before falling asleep.
“What you and Doctor Ruth talked about.”
He groaned. “Right now? No. What I want to do right now...” He rolled onto his side and scooted closer to her, grinning.
“You have a one-track mind,” she complained with a laugh.
“Only when it comes to you, gorgeous,” he assured.
“Wasn’t always like that, though,” she pressed.
Al sighed and ran a hand down his face. “Man, you really know how to throw cold water on a situation.”
She sat up and looked at him. “Well, I’m sorry, Al, but...I feel we should talk about this. It’s been four years, and you never really told me what happened in the Waiting Room.”
With a defeated sigh, he also sat up. “But right now? In bed? C’mon, Tina. It’s a bit more...involved than just a couple quick sentences.”
“Ok.” She sat quietly, waiting.
He growled in frustration. “All right, all right.” He sighed again. “Where do I even start?” He thought for a few moments. “I gotta admit, I was a bit...well, flummoxed when Ziggy said the reason Sam had Leapt into Dr. Ruth was so she could meet me. That just didn’t make any kind of sense. I mean...all his Leaps had been to help someone in the past, usually someone who’s life was in danger, or would be.” He shook his head. “And, to be honest, I felt...hell, still feel, kinda...guilty.”
Tina frowned. “Why?”
“Well...” He gestured emptily with one hand. “It’s just...in the grand scheme of things...how important am I? Really?”
Tina was silent. That was a rather loaded question, and she wasn’t sure how to answer. Or even if she should try to answer.
“Whatever’s been in charge of Sammy bouncing around in time, it always put him somewhere where he could do the most good. Save a young woman whose appendix burst on a plane when they were nowhere near land, stop a serial killer from killing a woman and her little girl, that sort of thing.”
“But that wasn’t always the case, Al. Look at what he did for Donna.”
Al rubbed his jaw. “Yeah, sometimes the Leaps...broke the laws a bit. Whatever laws were really governing what he was doing, that is.”
“’More like actual guidelines’,” Tina quoted from a movie they’d gone to see last year.
Al chuckled. “Good point. So...why me? I mean...he did good back there, getting that producer and the announcer together, saving that young woman from her stalker of a boss. I just...Honey, I love you, but...is our relationship really so important?”
“I think it is,” his wife said firmly. “Al...all your other relationships were failures.” When he groaned she took his hand. “Now don’t go getting down on yourself, babe. There was some...underlying thing that kept them from working out. Right?”
Al swallowed hard. “Yeah. Dr. Ruth...she managed to...pinpoint my fear of abandonment. She said...” He closed his eyes and thought back, trying to get the words right. “She said my...fear of abandonment made me afraid to be hurt in a relationship, so I would...screw it up on purpose so I couldn’t get hurt. Even if that meant I hurt someone else.” He opened his eyes and saw the tears start falling from Tina’s. “Hey...” He gently dried the tears.
She captured his other hand and kissed it. “Not just your wives,” she said quietly.
He frowned. “What do you mean?”
“People you worked with, like Gooshie. Sam...”
“I...I never...hurt Sammy,” he denied, then frowned. Had he? He didn’t think so. Sam was the closest thing to a brother he’d ever had. He loved Sam, would die for him. Nearly did, in fact.
Tina interrupted his thoughts by asking, “What did she say to you? Just before you came to see me.”
Al sighed. That was one conversation he’d never forget. “Well...that last session, she’d started by asking me about you. How long we’d been together, that kinda thing. She asked me if I loved you and...” He swallowed hard, and freed one hand to dab at the corner of his eye. “I told her I couldn’t say that word, because I didn’t think I could ever use it again...after Beth.” He licked his lips and fought down the sob that was trying to rise up his throat. “She...” He cleared his throat and tried again. “Dr. Ruth, she...she said that...people are different, so the way we love them should be different, too. I loved Beth, but it was a different kind of love than what I felt for you. And...she kinda...well, tricked me into saying it out loud. That I loved you.” He grinned. “She was sneaky that way.”
“I’m glad she was. I really needed to hear you say it, Al. I was...beginning to wonder, worry that...maybe...”
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry.” He pulled her to him and held her, and they both began to cry.
“And it doesn’t hurt?” Maxine asked uncertainly.
“Not a bit. There’s a little...tingle, and then a sensation like...moving through a wind tunnel, and then the next thing you know, you’re there.”
“But I’ll still...be me? I won’t...end up someone else?”
“I told you, we can target where you end up. It’s actually a bit easier sending you back to yourself.”
Maxine considered what she was being asked to do. It seemed simple enough. She really didn’t have to do anything. Not at first, anyway. And then when she got...where she was going, all she had to do was something she’d been wanting to do for years. Then everything would be...better. The way it was supposed to be. And she and Cat would be together again.
“All right,” she agreed. “I’ll do it. One question though: How am I gonna get out of here? I don’t have any privileges.”
Zoe smiled a cold smile. “Leave that to me. Be ready to go in two days.” She leaned closer to Maxine, and her voice was as cold as her smile had been. “And don’t breathe a word of this to anyone. No one would believe you, anyway, and if you say anything they’d lock you up in solitary confinement.”
Maxine swallowed hard. She’d heard about solitary, and shuddered at the prospect of being locked in a padded cell with no windows, no furnishings but the bed.
Zoe leaned back in her chair and smiled to herself as Maxine left the office. The pieces were finally in place. Very soon the Admiral would be dead, at the hands of his ex-wife, and the interfering Doctor Beckett would be next. Zoe hoped the grief would drive him to take his own life, but if it didn’t, she had a back-up plan. The only loose end was dear Alia. But they’d find her. It was only a matter of time. And when they did...
It was raining heavily. It was a cold rain, coming down diagonally as the wind picked up, then falling straight down when the wind died, soaking everything and everyone. The ground was already saturated, and puddles quickly began to form, adding to the misery of the day.
Everything was dark and dreary – the air, the umbrellas people were using, their clothes, their faces. Finally the moment came when the casket was lowered into the ground, and one by one they left the gravesite, trudging through the rain, churning the ground into mud. She lingered, though. She had to see the name on the tombstone. It wouldn’t be real until she saw the name engraved in granite. She stepped forward, wiping rain off her face so she could see clearly...
The sleeper thrashed under the covers and let out a small sound, then drifted back into dreams once more.
“We’ve lost him.”
“No.”
“I’m sorry. There wasn’t anything we could do. His injuries were too extensive. I’m sorry.”
“No.” She sunk to the floor, legs splayed, and shook her head slowly. “No. It...it’s not...it’s not possible.”
The doctor looked down on her sympathetically. “Even if you’d gotten him here immediately...”
The sleeper tossed her head back and forth, a frown creasing her face.
As she walked the corridor, everything around her started changing. The walls, which were normally institutional white, shifted to a pale blue. Doors changed from motion-activated steel to standard wood. People started fading in and out. She picked up her pace, panic starting to creep into her heart. She hurried around the corner...and suddenly there was nothing there. No door, no walls, nothing. She was standing in the middle of the empty desert.
She looked around in confusion. This was the site, she knew that; she recognized landmarks. But...there was nothing here. No mountain, no complex, nothing. Not even a road. How was this possible?
There was a distant rumble, and she turned toward the sound. After a while she saw a cloud of dust on the horizon, and then a large truck emerged from the dust. The driver spotted her and slowed to a stop. He leaned out and looked at her.
“You must be lost,” he said.
“I...I guess I am. I...I thought I knew where I was, but...” She looked around again. “Nothing’s where it should be.” She walked closer to the truck. “Maybe you can help me. I’m looking for...” She stopped when she got a good look at the driver. “Al?”
The man behind the wheel frowned at her. “Do I know you?”
“Of course you know me. What’s going on?”
“I’d ask you the same thing. Look, kid, you’re cute and everything, but I really don’t have time for whatever game you’re playing. If you’re lost I can give you directions. Otherwise...” He indicated the empty desert ahead of his truck. “I’ve got somewhere I need to be.”
She frowned. Why was he treating her like this? And where the hell was the Project? “Look, I don’t know what’s going on here, but I don’t appreciate your attitude. Just give me a lift back to the Project, all right?”
Now he glared at her. “Who the hell are you, and what do you know about Star Bright?”
She shook her head. “Star Bright? Nothing. I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about...” And she trailed off as she realized... “Oh, no,” she said softly. “It’s...gone.”
Suddenly the driver leaned impossibly far out of the window and grabbed her by the throat. Yanking her up to the truck door, he snarled in her face. “It is gone. And he’s dead. And that means so are you, you little punk. All of you are dead.” As he squeezed harder, his eyes started to glow red and he laughed, a horrible, raspy sound that hurt her ears. “You just don’t know it yet.”
Sammy Jo exploded out of bed with a strangled scream, her heart hammering so hard she thought she was going to be sick. Her throat ached, and she stumbled to the bathroom, half expecting to see finger marks on her skin. She flinched as the light came on, and squinted at her reflection in the mirror. There was no sign of being strangled, and as her mind started to clear she realized that the reason her throat hurt was because it was dry, most likely from gasping in her sleep. With trembling hands she turned on the faucet and let the water run cold. She filled the glass and drained it once, then filled it again and set it aside. She splashed water on her face, and looked again at her reflection.
Only it wasn’t hers looking back. There was a stranger in her mirror, someone she’d never seen before. The woman looking back at her had hazel eyes and sandy brown hair worn in a short bob. There was a haunted look in her eyes, and she seemed incredibly sad.
“I’ll keep him safe,” the reflection promised.
Sammy Jo raised a hand towards the glass, but the strange apparition vanished before her fingers touched the surface. She stared into the mirror, wondering if she was still dreaming, or if she was having some kind of mental breakdown. She reached blindly for the water glass with one hand while she swung the medicine cabinet door open with the other. She had some sleeping pills that Verbeena had given her...
As the door swung towards the wall Sammy Jo caught a glimpse of someone standing behind her, and she whirled around, hurling the glass towards the invader. She dodged to the right and lunged towards the door, hoping to escape...whoever was in her room.
“Crap!” a voice exclaimed, as the glass hit the wall two inches wide of the mark.
Sammy Jo spun around...to see Cat, cringing, arms over her head to shield against anything else that might be flung her way.
“Oh, god, Cat...I...I’m so sorry. I...”
Cat slowly straightened, and backed up a step, hands up in a blocking gesture. “My fault. Should’ve knocked. I was on my way to the library, heard you scream.”
Sammy Jo sighed and slumped into the couch. “I...I had a nightmare,” she said, shaking her head. “Guess I...overreacted.”
“Bit,” Cat agreed, moving into the living room. “Wanna talk?” She still seemed wary, which made Sammy Jo groan in misery.
“I really am sorry, Cat. I...” She sighed and ran both hands down her face. “I could’ve really hurt you.”
“Yeah, ya could’ve. Didn’t, though.” Cat grinned. “’cause I’ve got cheetah reflexes.”
Sammy Jo couldn’t even crack a smile. Cat crossed to sit across from her, and waited quietly.
“Ya know...I don’t know if I can...It was all so...real. And...to be honest? I’m not even sure I’m really awake right now.”
“I could pinch you,” Cat offered.
Sammy Jo looked at her oddly. “I’d take you up on that...if I wasn’t afraid you’d enjoy it.”
Cat frowned, then leaned forward and rested her elbows on her knees. “You know I’m not into torture. Whatever this...dream was, it’s got you really rattled. So...spill.”
Sammy Jo took a deep breath, held it, then let it out slowly. “Ziggy? Can you wake Doctor Beeks and have her come down to my room, please?”
“Doctor Beeks is not currently in residence,” the computer informed her.
“What do you mean, she’s not currently in residence? Where is she?”
“I...am not sure, Doctor Fuller. I started with her apartment, and scanned the entire project. She is nowhere to be found.”
Sammy Jo looked at Cat, feeling a strange sense of panic starting to mount. “That...is very not good,” she said, getting up. She hurried to her room and grabbed clothes. “We gotta go wake Dad,” she informed her friend, hurriedly getting dressed. “And probably Al, too. I’ve got a feeling something very, very bad is going to happen. Soon. We might even be too late.”
Cat frowned. “You’re freaking me out here, Sammy Jo. What’s going on?”
Sammy Jo came back out. “I think Dad was right. I think...they’re still out there. And they’re gonna do something, hurt or maybe kill someone here.”
He saw her at the end of the hotel’s bar, and was immediately attracted. She had amazing bone structure and a very exotic look, and she seemed so...regal the way she sat there, quietly sipping a cosmopolitan and somehow above it all without being cold. The red dress she had on was a striking contrast to her skin tone, and she seemed to both know and not care.
Picking up his drink, he made his way towards her, and sat down, keeping one empty stool between them. “Hello,” he said, raising his voice a bit so she could hear him over the din of the nearly full bar. “I know this will sound terribly cliché, but I saw you from across the bar...”
“And you just had to get to know me, right?” she replied, a slight smile quirking one corner of her mouth.
He tilted his head in acknowledgement of her assumption. “As I said...”
“You don’t want to sound cliché,” she finished, with a chuckle. She set her drink on the bar and reached her hand towards him. “Verbeena.”
He blinked, and then smiled and shook her hand. “Thames. Good to meet you.”
“That remains to be seen,” she said, with a sly look.
As the evening progressed, Alia had a harder time not getting disgusted. But, this was her mission, and she had to see it through to the end, no matter how she felt personally. She’d been a bit worried when she’d shook hands with Thames, afraid he’d be able to see her for who she really was, but when he gave no reaction she was relieved. In the past, whenever she and Sam had touched, they’d been revealed to each other as their true selves. Perhaps that only worked between two Leapers, however.
She still wasn’t quite sure just what she was here to do. She only knew that she had to find a way onto their project so it could be destroyed. When she’d seen Thames sitting down the bar, she’d panicked at first, worried that somehow they knew where and who she was. When he’d come over to her, she’d fought the instinct to flee. Odds were he’d never seen Verbeena Beeks before, might not even know she was associated with Sam’s Project. And when he sat on the stool near her and used that tired pick-up line, she knew she was safe. Well, relatively speaking.
One of the many things Zoe had taught her was the art of seduction, and Alia employed every trick she’d learned now. She acted coquettish, let him buy her drinks, expressed intense interest in everything he had to say, even when she knew his statements to be outright lies. In short, she played him by letting him play her. And in the end it paid off; he asked if he could drive her home.
Thinking fast, she said, “Oh, I don’t have a place. I mean...I just got into town. Just checked in and then came down here for a drink.”
He smiled as he stood. “Well...how about we go back to my place, then? I can guarantee it’s much more...interesting than a hotel room.”
“Mmm. Well, I don’t know. We only just met...”
“It’s not that far.” He smiled and added, “I promise to be a perfect gentleman.”
“Well...all right,” she agreed, standing up. She pretended to wobble a bit and looked embarrassed when he caught her elbow to help her stay upright.
“Let me just settle the tab, then we can get out of here,” he said, slipping out his wallet.
“This is bad,” Al complained, pacing the floor. “This is really bad. Sammy Jo’s having nightmares, Sam’s having...hallucinations, and now Verbeena’s missing?”
Tina sighed as she watched him pace. Ziggy had awoken them twenty minutes ago, and they’d met Sam and Donna in Sammy Jo’s apartment. Sammy Jo had told them about her nightmare, and Sam had reluctantly told them about the...vision or whatever he’d had during dinner.
“We don’t know she’s missing, honey. She’s just...not here right now.”
“She’s missing,” Al stated with conviction. “Something very bad happened.”
Sam was inclined to agree with his friend. “Security isn’t as tight as it used to be,” he pointed out.
“While that may be true, Doctor Beckett, I would have detected anyone else entering the project,” Ziggy informed him, a slightly haughty tone in her voice. “No one did.”
“Then where is she?” Al wanted to know. “If she wasn’t abducted...”
“She probably just went home,” Cat hazarded. “I mean...she had a home, other than here, right? Maybe she had to go...take care of finances or something.”
“She would’ve left a note,” Al assumed. Tina took his arm as he passed her again, and he finally came to a stop, heaving a frustrated sigh.
“Let’s not assume the worst,” Sam cautioned. “Maybe Cat’s right. Maybe Verbeena just...had to go home for some reason. I’m sure she’ll call us in the morning, or in the next few days if she’s not going to come back right away.”
“Sam’s right,” Donna agreed. “And right now, I’m more concerned about you two.” She looked at Sammy Jo, who was sitting on the couch with Cat, and then at her husband. “Sharing nightmares isn’t exactly normal.”
“I have a theory about that,” Sammy Jo ventured. “Donna, you said earlier the reason Dad was able to end up as his great-grandfather during the Civil War was because of some kind of...genetic transfer, right?” When Donna nodded she suggested, “Well, maybe that’s what’s going on here. I mean, you don’t get much closer of a DNA match than parents and children. So...” She shrugged.
“What? You two are somehow....mind-merging?” Tina questioned.
“Is that even possible?” Cat asked. “I mean...that happened to Sam during Leaps if his mind and the other person’s were kinda...close in neural patterns or whatever, but...he never Leapt into you.”
“No, but I was...created at the moment of a Leap-in,” Sammy Jo pointed out.
Sam stared at his daughter, his mind racing with possibilities. If what she’d said was true, then...
“Wow,” Tina said quietly.
“Interesting hypothesis, Doctor,” Ziggy said. “I shall run some computations.”
“So...now what?” Cat wanted to know. “It’s...” she looked at her watch, “four in the morning. I don’t know about the rest of you, but I totally won’t be able to get to sleep now.”
Sam stretched, and rubbed his eyes. “I honestly can’t remember the last time I got a full night’s sleep.”
“Things have been a bit...stressful around here lately,” Donna admitted, wrapping an arm around his waist.
“500 rummy?” Al suggested. When they all looked at him as if he were nuts, he shrugged a shoulder. “Just figured playing a card game was better than going off alone and worrying.”
Her “perfect gentleman” passed out shortly after they got back to his quarters. He sat down on the couch and waited while she went to “freshen up,” but in reality she was just hiding in the bathroom, biding her time. Alia had remembered his low tolerance for alcohol, and had made sure to nurse one drink to his two, knowing that it wouldn’t take long for the alcohol to have an effect on him.
While Thames snored, sprawled on the couch, Alia carefully, and quickly, looked around his quarters for any indication of what they were up to. It was strange being back here, being “behind enemy lines,” as it were. But she had a mission.
For privacy, Lothos didn’t monitor the staff’s quarters, or their personal computers, because every so often one of them might be required to do some...work for an outside interest. Work of a sensitive nature.
It only took Alia a few minutes to locate his laptop and start scanning folders. Some were encrypted, and she didn’t have the time, or the means, to crack them. A few were password protected, but she finally found one that she could open. As she’d hoped, it was Zoe’s report to him on the progress of their latest target. She skimmed it, her heart racing as she realized what they were hoping to accomplish. If they were successful, the lives of those she considered friends would be ruined, one of them ended. From what she read she’d only have a week to figure out how to stop them, without giving herself away, or endangering her host.
Thames groaned, and Alia froze, looking towards the couch; she couldn’t be caught at his computer. He was still sleeping soundly, however, so she closed the file and shut down the laptop. Snatching a tissue, she wiped any surface she might’ve touched, then threw the tissue in the toilet and flushed. Then, her stomach in a knot, she went and sat on the couch, at the opposite end from Thames, and waited for him to come around. It wouldn’t do for her to be missing when he woke up. She’d have to fight down the revulsion she felt towards the man and keep up the pretense of just being someone he picked up in a bar.
In the meantime she tried to figure out what she could do to prevent their plan from working. She knew that any interference during a Leap could kill the Leaper, but she couldn’t think of a way to do that without herself, or, more importantly, Verbeena, being put at risk. And she couldn’t kill someone in cold blood, not while she was on a path of redemption.
But she wondered if there was some way she could destroy this project, this horrible bastardization of Sam’s own Project. What could she do that could cause a catastrophic failure, something they couldn’t rectify? If only she could create an electrical storm...
“So, when exactly are you...sending me back?” Maxine asked. They were back in Zoe’s office at the rehab clinic, on the day Zoe had arranged to have her released for a weekend outing. Which, of course, was not what was really going to happen.
“I told you: as soon as Lothos is done running all the tests. If they all come back clean, then it’s just a matter of syncing up your brainwave patterns...”
“No, I know that,” Maxine interrupted. She cringed when Zoe glared at her, but pressed on. “I mean, what time? In my life. When...” She trailed off, having a hard time finding the words to convey what she was thinking. “What point in my life are you going to send me back to?”
Zoe raised an eyebrow. “Is there a particular time you think would be better?”
“Well...I was kind of thinking...if this whole thing is supposed to be believable, I mean...give my cover story more credibility, then...it should be while I’m pregnant.”
Now Zoe’s other eyebrow rose, and she smiled slightly. “I like the way you think. Very devious.” She tapped her pen against her teeth as she thought for a few moments, and then offered, “After this is over, if it all goes well...would you consider staying with us?”
Maxine blinked. “You mean...working for you?”
Zoe nodded. “Yes, exactly. We...have an opening, as it were. We’re in need of someone with your...unique way of thinking.”
Leaning back in her chair, Maxine thought about it. If she was successful, she’d be free. She’d have her daughter back, her interfering ex-husband would be out of the picture, permanently, and all the bad that had happened to her – the painkiller addiction, all the months of rehab – none of it would have happened. “But...if I do this, and it works, then...wouldn’t I already be working for you? I mean...isn’t that how it works? Change the past, and...the future, which is the present, gets changed, too?”
“Yes. But if you want to be part of my team, then there are certain things you’ll need to do back then in order for me to notice you. The me of back then, I mean.”
“Oh.” Maxine thought about it for a while, and then slowly nodded. “All right. If everything goes according to plan, then...yes, I’ll work for you. I like the...idea of what you do.” She smiled. “Putting things wrong. Why should people’s lives be...smooth sailing? If you don’t have adversity to overcome, you can’t grow.”
Zoe stood and reached across the desk. When Maxine stood and took her hand, she said, “Welcome to the group, Maxine Reynolds. Now, this is what you’ll need to do...”
“I must say, Samuel, it is good to finally have you home.”
Sam groaned. It had been years, and he still couldn’t get the Observer to stop using his full name. “Thank you, St. John. It’s good to be home.” Then he frowned; something didn’t feel right. He looked around at the familiar faces in Main Control – Tina and her husband Gooshie, Dr. Beeks, Donna...but someone was missing. Something...wasn’t right.
“Are you all right?”
“Hmm? Yeah. No...yeah, just...a bit woozy, is all.”
“I imagine so. Alpha had a little trouble getting a solid lock on you, but thanks to Dr. Fuller’s work, we were finally able to run the retrieval program.”
“Alpha?” Sam frowned. That didn’t sound right.
“Hello, Doctor Beckett,” a synthesized male voice said from the speakers overhead. “I must concur that it is good to finally have you home.”
“Thank you,” Sam replied, although silently he added, “I think.”
Two days later, Sam woke out of a nightmare, and sat up in bed. He suddenly knew what was wrong, who was missing. For some reason his waking mind couldn’t remember, but his sleeping mind did.
“Oh, Al,” he said quietly. “What happened? Where are you, buddy?”
Donna woke up when she heard Sam crying, and pulled him down to her. This was the third time he’d had this nightmare since he came home, but the first time he’d been able to put a name to “this face that I keep seeing, but he fades away before he can say anything.” She didn’t know who Al was, but evidently he was someone that Sam cared a great deal about.
“Shh. It’s ok, honey. It’s ok,” she soothed, holding Sam close. “We’ll figure it out. We’ll talk to Dr. Beeks tomorrow, see if she can hypnotize you and help you to remember.”
Sam nodded, feeling as if his heart was breaking, but he didn’t know why. The longer he was awake, the more the memory of the person in the dream faded. Memories of his Leaps were slowly fading away, but he didn’t want to forget this person, this...Al. Somehow he knew that Al was someone very important to him, and the thought of forgetting him hurt.