Quantum Leap

Dentelle noir

PG-13 for situations and space-time screw ups.

Summary: AU. 3x4. After his time machine fails with him in it, Quatre finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong. But in this Leap Quatre will meet someone who will change his history. Can fate correct what went wrong?

"...Oh boy," Quatre said getting over that momentary nausea from leaping into a whole other body. He found a mirror right beside him, thank God, and in it he was quite attractive if he dared to think so. He was short and slender (almost like his real body), and at the moment his host was wearing a killer pair of red Stiletto heels and a matching set of earrings to highlight her short curly brown hair. A quick search of a wallet near by revealed...

"Your name is Cat Collins. Reporter. The year is After Colony 175," Duo, or rather, the holographic projection of Duo, produced cheekily.

Duo smiled and proceeded to have fun pretending to grab at Quatre's ass playfully until his palm-computer beeped monotonously. Duo poked around the computer, making as many faces as he could while doing it. It was one of Quatre's only constants in his ever-fluctuating life. "Heero says it's April sixth 175 and...holy shit. Tomorrow...a terrorist attack will take out an entire conference of pacifists, including Colony Representative Yuy. You only have one day to stop it."

Theorizing that one could time-travel within his own lifetime, Dr. Quatre Winner led an elite group of scientists into the desert to develop a top-secret project known as "Quantum Leap". Pressured to prove his theories or lose funding, Dr. Winner prematurely stepped into the project accelerator, and vanished...
He awoke to find himself trapped in the past, facing mirror images that were not his own, and driven by an unknown force to change history for the better. His only guide on this journey is Duo, an observer from his own time, who appears in the form of a hologram that only Quatre can see and hear, guided by the information from Heero, a fusion of brain cells and technology in their own time. And so Quatre finds himself leaping from life to life, striving to put right what once went wrong, and hoping each time that his next Leap...will be the Leap home...

Quatre rummaged around the place, realizing quickly he was in a simple apartment furnished rather brightly, but sparsely. Creative. Not rich. The lack of bills in her...his wallet attested to that fact. Quatre looked to his outfit, then to the smirking hologram, "I'll wear the heels, but I am NOT wearing this mini-skirt!"

With only one day, Quatre really wasn't sure how to stop the shooting-just that he had to. Duo and Heero were of no help yet. Heero was still going through the probability calculations back in their own time, so Quatre did what usually worked-wandering around and hoping for inspiration.

A cell phone jingled merrily from his pocket and Quatre answered it meekly, "Hello?"

"CAT! You BETTER be at the preliminary questionnaire panel, or so help me God, I'll dock the REST of your pay for the next FIVE years!!!" The man sounded ready to explode and, while Quatre had just leapt there and had never even met the man, he envisioned a red-faced editor screaming into the phone and punching his desk like a two year old.

"...I lost the directions, sir! Where's the panel being held again?" Quatre covered quickly.

Duo popped up beside him with a victorious smile, "Heero says there's a preliminary panel being held right now. He's working on the location..."

Quatre was already going, trotting over to a handy vidphone and searching local maps for the address the editor (he assumed) gave him. Quatre realized the high-tech camera slung across his shoulder and dangling at his hip gave him all the pass he needed to get in there. Now all he had to do was stop an assassination. Piece of cake; right?

---

The press of bodies trying to get into the media entrance was terrible! People were everywhere, shoving, prying, and sliding through legs just to get a better spot. Quatre didn't care, really. He just wanted to scope out the scene and the targeted politicians. It might help him figure out how to STOP the mass execution. In the life of a leaper knowledge was the only power they held. It was why Quatre was there.

That thought spurned him to get into the fray, shouldering right in front of a tall black-haired man. It was an electric shock, and then Quatre was blinking stupidly, looking up into narrowed green eyes. Temporarily stunned, Quatre kept pushing past the tall man with the sweep of cinnamon hair-he swore it was black not a minute ago-and made his way into the auditorium. His body was still tingling from that shock, his intuition screaming that he had to find that man, and Quatre found himself searching the gathered crowd.

He spotted him, sliding around the edges of the room sleek and cat-like, and if Quatre didn't know any better he would say that the man was not looking for good photo opportunities; he was casing the place.

"Duo. DUO!" Quatre whispered to himself, trying to call his holographic friend to him. Duo materialized right beside him, half way merged into another person.. It was the glory of being intangible and invisible to everyone but Quatre. Hell, Duo had to get his holographic kicks somewhere.

"Heyya!" Duo greeted cheerfully. Quatre tipped his head to show the braided hologram the man sliding around the room. Duo materialized by the side of the sneaky bastard, and put Heero's CPU to use.

The panel started sending rapid-fire questions from every direction. Quatre pulled out a note pad to look the part of studious reporter, and saw a list of questions already ON it!! Cat Collins was prepared...unfortunately, Quatre was not planning to waste time actually asking.

Duo materialized next to his friend, grinning from ear to ear, "That was your boy. Heero says his name is Drei. He's working on getting more for you. But he's got a police record as long as you with about twelve counts of attempted murder. You pinned our assassin in one go, Quat. This is going to be one short leap."

"What do you propose I do now that I've found the assassin? Give him a flat time?" That didn't work last time, and Quatre just found himself leaping into another body less then a week later to fix the same problem about to repeat itself. He had learned that he had to change it for good, or not bother.

Heero beeped monotonously again, and Duo consulted the screen...his smile faded.

Quatre felt his stomach plummet, "Duo?"

"Heero says Drei's death is listed as April seventh. Quatre..." Wasn't it obvious what he had to do? To protect all those pacifists, he had to kill the assassin. He had to kill. Suddenly his breath began to catch in his chest, and his head began to pound.

Quatre moved out of the room quickly, running headlong into reporters and cameramen as he sped to the exit. He freed himself from the room and broke into the back alley, sucking deep breaths of polluted LI ghetto air as he just moved, running as fast as the heels would allow him.

Finally he tripped up, catching the stupid stiletto on a grate and pitching forward.

"HEY!" A warning voice called and two arms were catching the time-leaper's fall. There was no electric shock this time, but Quatre knew without the shadow of a doubt who had caught him. Fate was too cruel for it to have been a random bystander. If Quatre had learned anything it was that nothing was random or isolated. Every little thing affected everything else like ripples, growing and growing. One man's actions could change the world. His had. Many, many times.

"What the hell?" The voice questioned again. Quatre lifted his eyes, hoping that it would be anything but green eyes hidden under a fall of cinnamon hair. His hopes were in vain.

He also noticed that the to-be-assassin's features were as chiseled as a Greek God's and that his arms were solid muscle attached to a sinfully cut body.

"Thanks for catching me. Running in heels is a bad idea." Quatre said, turning his little flirting smile on the man. He hoped that if he could charm the assassin, he could figure out how to stop it all. Hopefully without death.

The green-eyed man raised a brow and took a look down Quatre's body. Of course, he was seeing Cat Collins just like Quatre saw in that mirror. The whole world saw Cat Collins except for Duo. But Duo was from Quatre's original time, and he was his only link to that life during this crazy quantum leap through history.

"I'm Cat. Cat Collins." Quatre introduced his host, stepping out of the man's hold to stand straight and tall (enhancing female attributes, he hoped, to the observer).

The green eyed man lifted a brow, "Drei," He supplied with a little upturned smile. Quatre noticed how easily social skills came to someone supposed to be an assassin. Perhaps the man was cocky and liked people to know him, like a serial killer who left calling cards. Thinking like that, Quatre was able to put his mission into perspective.

The man wasn't taking his leave just yet, watching Quatre, or rather Cat, for a few moments curiously. "You're a reporter?" The assassin broke the silence.

Quatre smiled slow and seductively, "Yeah. But there was far too much political bullshit going on in there. I needed some air."

Drei invited him for coffee and Quatre flirted shamelessly. It didn't hurt that the quiet bearing and gentle smiles from the other man were making Quatre's own heart begin to beat just a little faster. Drei was quite the charmer, even though he said very little. Before he knew it, Quatre was telling stories from other leaps, modifying just a little so it seemed CAT did those things. And Drei was a man of the world too, it seemed, and had his own wealth of stories that Quatre was able to pry out of him with a smile here and a batted lash there. All too soon the act of 'flirting with the killer' to get the upper hand gave way to casual conversation with a handsome man. And then real flirtation.

Quatre had never met anyone on any of his previous leaps, or even anyone in his own time, who intrigued him as much as Drei. Duo kept popping up whenever Quatre was left alone (since it looked kinda funny for Quatre to start talking to thin air) and reminding him that Drei was about to massacre a whole room of pacifists. But he couldn't leave the man. All day they were together, and slowly but surely, Drei began to smile more and more.

Until the call.

Drei's cell phone gave one no-nonsense beep, and he excused himself to answer.

Duo went to follow, but Quatre stopped him. He just couldn't-- he couldn't believe that Drei, the man he was all too quickly falling head over heels for, could really be involved in a massacre. Duo, though, was unaffected, "He's going to open fire on over twenty delegates and innocent bystanders in less then twenty hours! You need to STOP HIM! You're here to correct what's wrong, not make doe-eyes at cold blooded killer's sparking black eyes!"

"His eyes are green, Duo! And what if we're wrong! What if Heero's wrong? He says Drei... Drei doesn't live passed tomorrow... Duo, I can't be the cause! I know I can't! What if we're wrong and he's just going to be there at the wrong time?!"

"You need to stop him, Quatre!" Duo hissed, his hologram flaring bright and dull with the sheer emotion overrunning the circuits until he flickered off.

But Quatre couldn't respond; Drei had walked back into the room. He wasn't smiling. Quatre lifted a brow in worried question.

The tall man sat down on the couch (Quatre had taken him back to Cat Collin's apartment) and then pulled Quatre into his arms, "It was my...employer. Wondering where I was."

"He doesn't sound too understanding," Quatre said, feeling the tightness all over the man. Each muscle in his long, lanky body was well defined and sexy, but right now he was rigid with stress and holding him HARD.

Drei looked right into Quatre's eyes, worry mirrored in his deep emerald eyes, "Cat? Don't go to the conference tomorrow."

Quatre felt his tongue stick in his throat and his heart drop. That was nothing short of a confession...Tears began to well up in Quatre eyes, unbidden. Damn it all! "You're a good person, Drei! I can see it in you! You can't...you can't be capable of...anything." Quatre's heart was hammering with emotion, but he couldn't spill that he knew! How could he explain knowing the future?!

Drei put his hand to Quatre's shoulder and pulled him in, ghosting his lips along Quatre's jaw, "I know what is wrong and what is right, but sometime things go wrong. And someone has to fix it--even if we don't understand it at the time. Someone has to do the dirty work so that the world can become better. We need to fight for our future," And with that, he brought his lips to Quatre's, and gave himself into the kiss.

Quatre fought the tears and grabbed for him in the dark, in their loneliness. Quatre wanted him, wanted so bad for this to be his reality that he submitted to the kiss with a choked moan.

Duo popped up behind Drei's back, waving his hands and screaming, "Don't do this, Quatre! You aren't even a girl! He doesn't really see you!" Duo was desperate to bring Quatre back to his senses.

But Quatre needed, wanted so bad, to have him, just for one goddamned moment!

Drei's hands began to slide away from Quatre's shoulders, sliding down the blonde's clavicle and ready to dip down-- down to where Cat Collins would have breasts. The body Drei saw was not Quatre's. It was not him Drei wanted. With a cry, Quatre broke away from the passionate kiss.

Quatre could not do this! "I have to go," he begged, nearly sobbing it out as he disentangled himself from the couch and avoided the confused, reaching grasp. He broke free and went for the door, flying out and running as fast and as hard as he could until not even his own thoughts could catch up to him! But he didn't get far. He couldn't in Cat Collins's heels and an unfamiliar neighborhood. He just prayed that Drei would leave the apartment before Quatre had to go back.

He collapsed in an exhausted heap on a park bench, and there was Duo, looking over him with concern-- not that the hologram could do one damn thing for him! Duo existed in a whole other time and place. He wasn't really there. No one was really there. Was Quatre even really leaping into other people to set things right, or was he just a lunatic?!

"You did the right thing," Duo said. "You're a leaper, Quatre. Someone has to do the dirty work to make sure the future works out right. Your job is the save all those people, and as soon as you do, you will leap out of here. Maybe this is the last one," Duo tried, but in the face of Quatre's heartbreak, it lacked the usual uplifting optimism...or even that last glimmer of hope Quatre had come to rely on.

The blonde put his forehead to his curled-up knees and let it out until he fell asleep on the park bench, red-eyed and emotionally drained.

April 7, AC 175.

The conference delegates had just finished their closed-room discussions. The doors opened and a team of guards, flanked all around with loud, pushy reporters circled the delegates as they moved into the atrium-like hallway.

On the second floor, all the offices seemed deserted, and nothing showed otherwise. Except for a little blonde reporter desperate to get into 10A. Heero said that the shots, and Drei's murdered body, were traced back to that office, so Quatre was desperate to get in and stop the murder-- and the massacre.

The door was locked, and Quatre could have just made a fuss to attract the guards, but...but Drei was in there. He couldn't let Drei die. Not when Quatre still had breath left in him! He used every dirty trick in the book and finally, the lock opened with a click and Quatre swung the door open.

A safety clicked off from the darkness of the office.

Quatre knew he had only moments to save himself and the delegates. "Don't do this," he whispered softy, earnestly.

Drei moved, dropping his gun to his side and moving in front of another shooter, "He's with me."

Quatre ran into the room, wrapping his arms around the tall assassin and burying his face into the man's chest, "Please Drei. You're a good person. You can't do this! We shouldn't be fighting each other. This has to end!"

The other assassin was looking between Drei and Quatre in confusion, and then he seemed to come to the decision that he didn't care. "This is no place for some chick. I don't need witnesses," the man sneered. He was tall, imposing and had a German lilt to his voice-- Odin Lowe.

Drei blinked in complete confusion for a moment...a long enough moment that Odin lifted the gun and pointed straight at Quatre.

Drei moved. He landed an uppercut straight to Odin's jaw and knocked him to the floor in one fluid motion. The killer was out cold and wouldn't wake up until the delegates had moved out of range.

"Let's leave, Drei. Let's go," Quatre urged him. Behind Drei, Duo was suspended in air, grinning and doing the victory dance while he pointed excitedly to something on the screen. Heero must have said Quatre did it. His leap was over.

Drei was still alive though, and shooting Quatre that warm, apologetic smile that made Quatre worry. But the sensation of his leap coming to an end was tingling in his fingertips and working its way up higher. As soon as Drei took out Odin, he had altered the massacre. He was going to be leaving soon and would probably never see the green-eyed, cinnamon-haired man again.

Drei pulled Quatre close and touched a kiss to his ear, "I wish I could bring you with me, Cat."

And before his mind could comprehend, Drei turned the two of them, holding Quatre close to his chest and away from the window as he aimed and let out one perfect shot.

Terrified screams rang through the building and Heero Yuy went down with one, clean bullet between the eyes.

Quatre's leap began to pull at him harder, another time, another mission, was calling him, but his eyes stayed startled and confused. A bright blue light became visible around Drei-- the same light that was beginning to overtake Quatre.

Still holding him, the bright blue light getting brighter and brighter, Drei tried, "It was my mission to make sure Heero Yuy was shot. It was how it was meant to be. How it needed to be. I have to go. I wish I could meet you again-" and then he was gone. In his place was another face, a man shorter, with black tangled hair, unshaven and cruel-looking. He seemed so confused.

Quatre's leap wrenched him out of Cat Collins, his whole being torn from the scene and thrown headlong into something else. One more mission to make things right. Always one more. And he was at a time where Drei didn't exist anymore...

But was that even Drei he met?

The news of pacifist collony representative Heero Yuy's death spread through the colonies like wild fire. On earth, the United Earth Sphere Alliance began to exert military control over the people to stifle unrest. On the colonies, five scientists in development of project Gundam howled their outrage and began to hatch a plan: A plan to send 5 shooting stars to earth in revenge for Heero Yuy's assassination.

April AC 195.

In another time, in another place, in another life, two Gundams met in a stalemate. Pilot 04, Quatre Winner, lowered the hatch to Sandrock and stepped out. "We shouldn't be fighting each other."

And on the other side, another boy stepped out, arms raised and face clear.

An electric shock passed between them. Something like familiarity. Something like desire. Something that neither could ever, or would ever, explain. Something like fate correcting itself-- Or rewarding two of its heroes after the long, hard road behind them.

Their eyes met, and for some reason, they decided to trust.

Author's Notes:
Hey! Hope you all enjoyed my little foyer into Quantum leap. This fic was inspired and fostered solely by ChilledFlame, so inspirational credit goes to her! My wonderful beta was, as always, the wonderfully talented Cobalt27.

For the few of you who start to think really deeply into this fic, I have a few comments:
Why if it's a parallel life was Quatre named "Quatre" but Trowa named "Drei"?
Okay! I kept it 'Quatre' for sheer ease of reading. If I changed it AND the other names (ex. Duo, and Heero) then I thought it would be way to hard to follow. As for Drei-- Quatre is referring to him as he was introduced. Same as Q introduced himself as "Cat Collins" so too did Trowa introduce himself as Drei (which is German for 3, incidentally).

If Quatre designed the machine and Project Quantum Leap, how can there be another Leaper?
This is the essential unanswered question and fodder for fanfic of the entire Quantum leap universe. There are 'evil' leapers in the show, and so I think there could be good ones as well. How are there two? Who knows! Since Leaping is going back in time, it could be someone who leaped later. It could be a shadow Quantum leap project run by another, it could be the product of one of Quatre's Leaps gone wrong later which opened up a space-time continuum error. Who knows. Fanfic writers in the QL universe have played with the idea for years and researched a heck of a lot more then I did, so I didn't dare to tackle it here.

Is Heero a person, or the name of the computer?
Again, this goes back to the show QL where "Ziggy" is what they named the super computer created in Quatre's time with brian cells and computer technology combined to make it such a precise and omniscient machine! Duo is a person living in Quatre's time who works Heero and monitors Quatre's leaps. He is real, but he can only appear to Quatre as a hologram.

If I missed anything, please drop a comment and I'll try to get back to you!