Disclaimer: I own nothing. I thank the creators and owners of these characters for allowing me to write fan fiction for my own and others enjoyment.
You'd Better Watch Out
As the blue light faded away and Sam became aware of his senses, he was somewhat surprised to find himself seated in a rather large wing chair in what seemed to be a small living area. As he took more in, he realized that there were dolls, trains, and gingerbread houses on the shelves. It was certainly not quite like anything he'd leapt into before, or at least he didn't remember such a leap.
"Marvin," came a whispered voice from what appeared to be a speaker beside him.
"Marvin?" Sam answered back not sure if he was talking to someone or not.
A moment later a woman with a small child of about four walked into the room. The boy seemed somewhat unsure of himself. Sam wasn't sure why.
The woman, who appeared to be the child's mother said to the boy, "Now Marvin, you need to tell Santa what you want for Christmas."
The boy looked over to Sam and then back at his mother and began to cry. Sam stood up and as he did he noticed the mirror to the side.
"Oh Boy! I'm Santa."
The woman looked at him strangely and with a bit of disappointment told him, "His name is Marvin, not boy."
"Oh…no…that's not what I meant. Of course and I know Marvin. He's been on the top of my good boy list for quite some time." Sam was backpedaling and knew it. He grinned and was surprised he didn't feel any glue pull on his face from where the beard was attached. Looking again in the mirror, he realized that was because this was a real beard. His host certainly looked the part.
Marvin stopped crying and looked up at Sam with a hint of sadness. Turning to his mother he told her, "I thought we were going to see the real Santa, Mommy."
His mother started to tell him this was the real Santa and Sam stopped her. "Let me talk with him, ma'am." He bent down on his knee to get at eye level with the child. "Marvin, Santa has to be many places at the same time and he just can't do that, so he has a lot of helpers, like me, that hear all the wishes of the good little children. That way, Santa knows that each child will be able to let him know what they want. But you never know when it's a helper and when it's the real Santa.
Marvin smiled. "So I can tell you what I want for Christmas and I'll get it?"
Sam gave a slightly crooked grin. "Well, Santa will certainly try. Sometimes you will and sometimes you won't but no matter what, you should know that Santa does care.
Marvin thought about what Sam said for only a second and then nodded. "Okay. I'll tell you what I want." The two walked over to Sam's chair and the precocious little boy proceeded to tell Sam what he wanted. Sam noted that the mother was listening too. At the end of their visit they took a picture. As the mother and son were about to leave, a man dressed in green with red and white striped stockings peeked in.
"Aren't you going to give Marvin his candy cane, Santa?"
Sam noticed the bucket beside the chair that the 'elf' was nodding towards.
"But of course," Sam said. "I was so enjoying my conversation with Marvin, I forgot it was there."
The little boy grinned. Sam reached down and grabbed a candy cane and handed to the child. Marvin's grin grew bigger. "Thank you, Santa Helper."
"You're welcome," answered Sam.
The 'elf' gave him a look of incredulity. As the woman and boy left he moved closer and whispered. "Are you crazy? You're supposed to pretend to be Santa Claus. I'm supposed to be Santa's Helper.
Sam noticed the name tag on the man's uniform. "I know, um, Snowflake, but I can't lie to a child, especially if he sees through the mask." Sam was speaking literally but he knew, as an adult, Snowflake would take it as a metaphor.
"Well, you're the Santa. Thank God this is December 23rd and we only have one more day of this, Santa Chris."
Sam gave a weak smile. "Yeah. Only one more day."
Snowflake headed back to his post to give him the next child's name. As he walked out the door, a different door from another time opened and Al walked in.
Sam wasn't sure what to make of his friend's outfit today. He was dressed up like a dandy from what looked like King Louie's court.
"Where have you been and what the hell are you wearing, Al!" Sam whispered soto voice.
"Well, for yet another leap, we're not synced in time. It may be Christmas for you, but it's Halloween for me. I was at the project's costume party when you leapt. I figured you rather me show up this way than wait until I could change."
As he listened to Al's explanation, the leaping physicist shook his head. "I'm sorry, Al. I should have known there was a…mostly reasonable explanation."
Al nodded. "Okay then." He pulled the handlink out of his baby blue silk breeches and with a flourish of his lace trimmed cuff, he hit a few buttons on the multicolored computer link. "Let's see now. You're Chris Nicklas and it's…"
Sam interrupted. "December 23rd."
Al took a breath. It annoyed him when Sam jumped in that way, but he figured, it didn't hurt him to let the man feel some control over his situation. "Yeah, December 23rd, 1973. You're one of the mall Santas at The Mall in Louisville, Kentucky."
"Yeah, I you said that. Which Mall?"
"The Mall."
"Yeah, I get it. I'm in the mall. Which one?"
"No, Sam, that the name of the place." At Sam's look the strangely dressed, even for him, Admiral shrugged. "Listen, just because it doesn't have a creative name doesn't make it less of a mall."
Sam nodded at the strange logic of that statement.
From the left a whispered voice came through the speaker. "Cecilia."
Realizing his time to speak only to Al was drawing quickly to a close, Sam asked. "Why am I here?"
Al blew out a breath. "We don't know."
"Great, what else is new," replied Sam.
A single woman walked into the room. Sam looked around for the little girl that would accompany the rather young and definitely good looking woman. Al's eyebrows rose and a grin captured his face. "I think she's your next customer, you lucky dog!"
"Hi Santa," the woman breathed moving toward Sam and his lap.
"Cecilia?" Sam asked, his voice slightly stressed?
"Yes, Santa," She said, plopping herself down in his lap. "I'm afraid I haven't been a very good girl this year."
Al's grin got bigger. "I wish I could…"
Sam's eyes narrowed. "Al…" he warned.
"You'll…?" Cecila asked.
"I'll, um…" Sam coughed and then asked a question. "Aren't you a little old to be visiting Santa?"
She wiggled in his lap. "I didn't think anyone was too old." She smiled. "I've gotten a picture with Santa every year since I was four."
Sam looked relieved. "So you just want a picture?"
Al continued to leer at the woman, who was wearing a rather lowcut sweater. "What I wouldn't give to have her and a camera together."
Sam didn't say anything but shot a glance at his friend, before turning his attention back to Cecilia.
She looked at him a little confused. "Of course. You didn't think…?" She began to blush.
"Oh, no….no. I, um, just…well, we should look at the camera now. Smile."
The woman did as she was told and after giving Sam a little kiss on the cheek got up to retrieve her picture. "See you next year, Santa," she said with a little wave and a slight wiggle of her hips. Al started to walk out with her.
"Al! Get back here."
With the posture of defeat, Al turned back around. "Party pooper."
"Listen. I'm in a rather…strange situation here. I'm going to be dealing with lots of little children. You know, the one's that can see I'm not Santa Claus?"
"I never thought of that."
"Yeah, well, think about it now. You've got to get me out of here quick."
Al pushed the buttons of the handlink and the door to the older man's present opened. "We'll do our best, Sam. Meanwhile, you might need to work on why you're here. You seem to do pretty well with your gut feelings." With that, he left Sam's view, going back to the place that Sam wanted to see once more.
Sam sighed. Snowflake came in. "Okay, that's it for today."
"That's it?" Sam asked surprised.
"Yeah. It's 9'o'clock. Quitting time. I'd think you'd want to go home after that mob you saw today."
"Um, yeah. I guess I would."
"Well, see you tomorrow, Santa Chris."
Sam smiled. "Yeah. You too." He wasn't sure where he was to go to get out of his 'uniform.' He got up and started following Snowflake.
The man turned around. "Did you need something, Santa Chris?"
Sam shook his head. "No. I just need to get changed."
"Well, it's not going to help you going to the elves room."
Sam backpedaled again. "Um, yeah. I know. I just wanted to ask, um, well how many people you think will be here tomorrow?"
Chris laughed. "Yeah, I'm getting sick of this gig too."
Sam took a breath. "It's not that I'm sick of it. I just thought it would be interesting to see if the real number matches your predicted one."
"You want to bet?"
"Um, no. I just thought it might be interesting."
"Okay. Being Christmas Eve and last minute shoppers and all, I figure, probably it will be either really light or really busy. With the numbers you've been pulling in…hmmm…maybe 100?
"That many." Sam shrugged. There wasn't anything he could do about it until GFTW decided he'd done his job and leapt him out. "Okay. We'll see if you're right." He finished with an action he hoped with help him find his street clothes. "I'll just go back to the Santa's dressing area which is over…um…"
"There," finished Snowflake, nodding his head toward a room down a hallway.
"Yeah. There." Sam turned and headed to his dressing room giving a silent thanks to GFTW for the help. He entered the room and quickly found a locker with his host's name on it. Changing quickly, he pulled out his wallet that was in his locked personal area.
"Cannon's Lane, St. Matthew's," he read. "Okay…now I know where to go; now how do I get there." He found a set of car keys and started out towards the Mall parking lot. Since the shopping area had closed, the number of cars in the parking lot was few. Still, he wasn't sure which car was his. Fortunately, Al reappeared, this time in more normal clothes. Well at least clothes from his own time period.
"Take the red Pinto, Sam."
"Pinto?"
"Yeah."
Sam shrugged. "Okay." He tried his key in the lock of the car and indeed it worked. Getting in he started it. Al was able to give him directions to his apartment, or at least the apartment that belonged to his host.
As he drove they talked. Ziggy still wasn't sure why he was there but he was giving rather high odds that it had something to do with one of the people he worked with. Sam considered that. Snowflake was really the only person he'd met. "Who?" he asked.
"We're not sure. It could either be the cashier, Maria Thomas or the elf, Dave Branson."
"I take it that Dave Branson is Snowflake?"
"Yeah. Same guy," Al told him after checking the handlink.
Sam arrived to his 'home' quickly. We went in and found a rather unassuming abode. Al stayed a little with Sam but ultimately, the younger man decided he could use a little rest and Al left, promising to continue to dig the information up on why Sam Beckett found himself as Santa Claus.
The next morning Sam had a good breakfast and then headed by to the oddly named mall. This time he knew where to go and quickly got changed. He headed immediately to the small room he'd been at the day before. Taking his seat in the chair, he awaited his first customer, who turned out to be six.
After having a number of children over five and those that were younger than two coming through, Sam was beginning to enjoy the leap. While he didn't think he had children of his own, he found that he actually liked the young people with whom he was coming in contact.
As he worked with Dave Branson, they developed a comfortable rhythm. About an hour into his shift, the door opened and Al walked in. "What the heck are you doing, Sam?"
"What? I'm just doing what I'm supposed to do. Acting like my host."
"Well you must be doing something. Ziggy says there are several realignments of the timeline."
"Like what?"
"Like now several of the children have chosen different paths."
"Different paths?" asked Sam confused.
"Yeah. One of the girls you talked to now becomes a doctor that joins Doctors without Borders, and provides life changing care to the people she works with. One of the boys decided to become a firefighter. He's already saved four people from certain death."
"Wow, just by playing Santa Claus?"
"Yeah. What are you telling them?"
"Well, I've told them they should follow their dreams."
"I guess they've listened to you, Sam."
Sam continued to work through the day. With the children that called him on his obvious disconnect with St. Nicolas, he told them much the same as he did with Marvin. To a one, none gave him a hard time.
By the end of their final shift, Al indicated at least ten different and better timelines had been created. Sam smiled and then frowned. Obviously none of them were what GFTW was expecting of him. Since this was the last time he'd see either Dave or Maria, he decided he'd better take action. Before the two went off, he asked both of them to dinner and then went to change.
"That's it, Sam!" Al exclaimed.
"What?" Sam asked.
"You asked them to dinner. Now Dave and Maria get to interact in a non-work environment."
"And that's good?" Sam continued to try to figure out why such a small thing could change things.
"Yes. They will have dinner with Chris Nicklas and will start dating, leading to marriage. Good job, Sam."
"Thanks but I think I sort of stumbled into this one."
"Don't sell yourself short, Kid," Al responded. Before Sam leapt, Al got to say the words he so enjoyed saying. Several of Sam's leaps had taken place during the holidays, at least for the time-traveler, but they were few and far between. Now Al turned to his best friend. "Merry Christmas, Sam."
With a grin on his face, Sam returned the sentiment.
"Merry Christmas, Al." Then, GFTW decided to move the good doctor to another time and place and Al was left standing in the imaging chamber. Sam had leapt once more.