Chapter One
Boulder, Colorado
1975
"She's this way, Sam!"
Sam followed the sound of Carrie's voice to the end of the tunnel. The light was so dim in this part of the cavern that he could barely make out the shapes of his feet as he methodically made his way. The sweat from his hands created a grease feeling as he slid them along the rock wall. He knew that if he slipped right now that there would be no way for him to get a grip on anything. All he could hope for was that the level surface that he was on right now would hold out for a few more minutes.
He came around a corner and saw Carrie. It was a little unnerving to see her so brightly lit up even though the light in the cave was almost nothing. He had gotten used to it over the years. After all, he knew that she was not really there. She was in the imaging chamber which had plenty of light.
"Sam," she exclaimed when she saw him. "She's right there!"
"Can you put a light on her?" Sam asked.
Carrie held up her hand link and pressed a few buttons. There was a beeping noise and then a beam of light burst from the device and shone like a perfect spotlight across the cave. It lit up an area in a corner where a little girl sat curled up into a fetal position. She was whimpering silently. She did not hold her hands up or try to protect her eyes from the light at all.
"Is it too bright?" Sam asked.
"She can't see it," Carrie answered. "It's part of my imaging matrix."
Sam nodded and slowly moved toward the little girl. "Sarah?"
The girl stopped crying for a moment and looked up. She was startled by the sudden sound of Sam's voice. It looked strange to see her looking around blindly in the dark with such a bright light illuminating everything around her.
"Uncle Walt?" she called back. "Is that you?"
"It's me, honey," Sam said. "Are you hurt?"
"I'm cold," she said.
"Hypothermia is starting to set in, Sam," Carrie said. She must have been running a bio scan on the girl with her hand link. "She doesn't appear to have any broken bones or other injuries."
Sam nodded at the hologram and turned back to Sarah. "How did you get all the way down here? The tour doesn't come this deep in to the cave."
"I thought that I heard a waterfall," the girl replied. "I wanted to see it."
"She's talking about Clara falls," Carrie said. "That waterfall has been closed to the public for about ten years because the ground around it is too unstable. It's only another thirty meters west of here. The water there is nearly three hundred feet deep." Carrie looked up from her hand link and Sam recognized the look of horror on her face. He had seen it many times over the years. "Sam, if you had not gotten here when you did then she might not have ever been found."
"Its okay," Sam said to both Sarah and Carrie at the same time. "I'm here now. You're going to be fine."
Sam had finally made it to the little girl's side and gently picked her up into his arms. She hugged him tightly around the neck and he began the journey of following Carrie back to safety.
When they emerged from the mouth of the cave there was an entire group of men carrying flashlights, rope, and water getting ready to head inside. One look at him carrying the child and everyone breathed a sigh of relief.
"Sarah!"
Sam set the girl down on the ground just as her mother got close enough to swoop in and pull her back up again. There was a mixture of gratitude and chastisement with a whole lot of hugs. The woman turned to him with tears filling her eyes.
"I didn't even know that she was gone!" she said. "What is wrong with me?"
Sam pulled Sarah from the woman's arms and sent her away with a paramedic to be checked out. He knew that Carrie had originally told him that his mission had involved Sarah. History recorded that she went missing and was never found. He had fixed that. But his years of Leaping experience told him that there was another wrong to right here. He looked over the woman's shoulder at Carrie who was busy punching information into her hand link.
"You saved her life as well, Sam," Carrie said. "Originally she committed suicide about three months after Sarah's disappearance. She'll live now." But Sam could see on the young girl's face that there was more to it than that. And he could also tell that she knew that he wasn't buying it. "The state takes the child away from her two weeks from now because of her alcohol abuse."
Sam looked at the woman who was still staring at her with tear filled eyes.
"Terri," he said. "You've got to get hold of yourself. You're going to lose that little girl!"
"What?" the woman asked. She clearly had not expected his reaction to be so harsh.
"I'm sorry, sis," he said. "I can't tell you how I know, but Sarah will be taken from you if you don't quit drinking."
Terri broke down and burst into heaving sobs of sadness. Sam put his arms around her and helped her sit down on a bench. The crew that had been standing around staring began to spread out and move away from them, though there were a few lingering stares in their direction.
"I don't know what to do, Walt," she said between gasps. "Ever since Daniel died I've just..."
"You just stopped," Sam said. "You've stopped trying."
She nodded. "I didn't mean to."
"I know you didn't," he replied. "But you've got to try again. Sarah is your life and if you lose her I'm afraid of what will happen to you."
"I need help," Terri said.
Sam looked at Carrie.
"If you're wanting to know if Walt will be there to help her then the answer is yes," the young woman said. "For a while at least. Walt doesn't die until January of 2009."
"I'll help you," Sam said. He took both of her hands into his and smiled. "We'll do it together." She hugged him tightly and kissed him on the cheek.
"You're the best big brother that a girl could hope for," Terri said.
"Go be with your daughter," he replied. The woman got up and walked toward the ambulance where Sarah had been taken. Sam got up and stood next to Carrie. "How does it work out?"
"Sarah is still taken out of Terri's custody but it is only temporary while Terri is in a rehabilitation clinic for six weeks. After that there is not much recorded. Sarah grows up to be a geologist and at some time Terri even earns a degree as a botanist."
Sam smiles. He looked at Carrie. The young girl who had been with him all along his journey. He had vague recollections of another time stream where she had not been his companion. He still remembered Al, even though he knew that he was the only one who did. For some reason when his own timeline was changed he could remember both the way things were unfolding now and the way they had once been.
"You're doing a great job, Carrie," Sam said. "You really helped me out down there."
Carrie gave him a curious smile. "Why do you do that?"
Sam looked bewildered. "Do what?"
"You're constantly commenting on my abilities as if you're surprised at them," she said. "I've been doing this for a while, you know."
"Do I?" Sam asked. "How long have you been doing this?"
"Since your first Leap," Carrie replied.
"And how long ago was that?" Sam asked.
Carrie smiled. "You're not going to trick me into giving you information that you're not supposed to have."
"Why can't you tell me when my first Leap was?" Sam asked.
Carrie regained her professional demeanor. "You first stepped into the Quantum Leap Accelerator on August 1, 1999."
"Right," Sam said. "And this is 1975. So what good does that do me?"
"Sam, you know that your memory is full of gaps," Carrie said. "I'm not supposed to help fill in those gaps. You wrote the rules."
"No," Sam said. "Al wrote the rules and Gushi follows them."
"Admiral Calavicci had nothing to do with making the rules for Leaping," Carrie said. "All he did was gain us the initial funding. We've talked about this."
"Why haven't I Leaped?" Sam said with some frustration.
"The timeline is adjusting," she replied. "You should be Leaping any second."
"Maybe I can actually go home this time," Sam said.
"One can always hope," Carrie replied. Sam got the feeling that they had discussed that as well.
"Well, I think fifteen years is enough," he said.
Carrie shot him a look of disbelief. "What did you say?"
"I said that fifteen years was..." he trailed off as he realized what she had heard. "How did I know that?"
"Sam," Carrie said. But he did not hear what she was going to say. He felt the familiar vibration begin to tingle through his body and his vision filled with a brilliant blue light.
Sam Beckett Leaped.
