November 13, 1997
Stallion's Gate, Los Alamos, New Mexico
"Ziggy, I don't need medical mumbo jumbo! Plain English!" Al yelled.
"Dr. Beckett's brain is scrambled, Admiral. A positive neuron lock remains tenuous at this time," Ziggy replied.
"Scrambled like eggs? Or scrambled like a coded transmission?" Al asked in his raspy voice, startled slightly as he saw Donna approaching.
"The distinction is irrelevant, Admiral. The end result is the same. I am having difficulty connecting with Dr. Beckett," Ziggy said, close to pouting.
Donna was tensed, worried, Al could tell. There was always some base level of concern. Rarely did Sam have a leap where everything was a-ok. Hence, the need for the leap in the first place. But it had become the norm, and though she worried, she was accustomed to it now, and most days she could hold her fretfulness in check. You put up a front, Al had accused her frequently in the past. She guessed she did, but so did everyone else, in one way or the other.
This was worse, something she hadn't expected. Some aberration that Ziggy had detected in Sam's brain, that now was interfering with the normal location procedure. Even with her rational and scientific thought process, it was far too easy to let her imagination start to run wild, concocting all sorts of horrific reasons as to why this was occurring. Always, it ignited that ever present fear that at some point, Sam could be lost, irretrievably lost somewhere in time where Ziggy couldn't find him.
"Don't worry, Donna. We'll figure it out," Al insisted.
"What about the leapee in the waiting room?" she asked.
"He's beyond bamboozled. Worse than usual. Beeks had to sedate him," he said. He scratched the back of his head. "Look, you don't need to hang around here, fretting. Go home and rest. You've barely slept in the past two weeks, with Bobo the monkey and all." She grimaced at the memory of watching what appeared to her as her husband, completely nonverbal, almost feral, scratching up the walls in the waiting room like a caged animal.
God, she was exhausted, she knew, once she stopped to think about it. She felt it in her bones, a dragging fatigue that weighed 50 extra pounds and pulled at her shoulders like a heavy cloak. The thought of her bed, the soft pillows, the velvety soft blanket, surrounded with blessed darkness convinced her to agree with Al. She nodded in resignation, wishing as she did so that she would remain exhausted enough to disregard her worry in pursuit of rest. She had been forced to promise Al she would stay home for the duration of this leap, considering the lack of down time between the last three leaps. He had only shushed her when she'd mentioned his amount of sleep had been only slightly more than hers.
November 14, 1997
Stallion's Gate, Los Alamos, New Mexico
"What part of resting at home did you not understand?" Al scolded, standing on the doorstep outside her home.
"I was just checking with Ziggy, that's all," she said, wincing as she realized the lameness of her comment.
"If we run into a problem, I promise I'll let you know. He's there to solve a murder, from what Ziggy can tell. The pieces don't all add up. But they will, eventually."
"Gushie said it sounded like he'd remembered the simul-leap, but you told him you didn't," she said pointedly, changing the subject.
"I don't, really," he defended.
"Yes, you do, Al," she corrected him, her voice edged with petulance.
"Not the actual leap. Being in 1945. I don't remember any of that. Or of having pieces of Sam in my head," he insisted. Thank goodness, he thought mischievously.
"But you remember that it happened," she hissed. "Sam never has before, until now. At least that he's told you."
"I told him I didn't," Al said sheepishly. "I always deflect that as soon as possible, just in case he...you know."
"Remembers me?" she laughed bitterly, with no humor. "Don't worry, Al. He's forgotten lots of things, but nothing quite as completely as he's forgotten me. And there isn't the old excuse about him not being able to. He realigned with the altered reality. Those memories are there to forget this time."
She saw the pity in Al's eyes, burning on the inside. "Don't say it, Al."
"I have to say it. Because you let yourself forget. If he did suddenly remember you, all it would do is make everything harder on him. Hurt him. And that's exactly what you don't want."
She turned her back, struggling to still as the silent sobs ripped forth from deep in her chest. "Al, what if he is losing his mind?" She turned back to look at him, her face frozen with an unspeakable terror. It was, until this moment, an unspoken fear, thought of in only hushed whispers around the complex. Sam had never magnafluxed with anyone, before the orderlies at Havenwell Hospital had run electric shock through his brain. Dr. Beeks had voiced concern at the time that some permanent brain damage had been inflicted. The plan to examine him more closely when he had returned had been in place, only he hadn't been home long enough for her to examine him in any capacity. They had all been waiting with bated breath, to see if the one time had been a fluke, or was the start of a troubling trend. This instance was only reinforcing those fears.
"He's not losing his mind," Al poo-pooed her.
"I heard what you said to Gushie. How he wasn't making sense. That he felt like he was possessed. That he didn't know you were there," she sobbed. "He definitely underestimated the effect on his memory. What if all this leaping is causing parts of his brain to deteriorate somehow? Or that the shock treatment is doing that for him? That he'll just be burned out by the time we ever get him back, that he won't remember any of us or...or..."
She'd started hyperventiliating, she knew. Al grabbed her shoulder, moving her to the sofa to sit. "I'm not going to let that happen. We're one big unit, him and me and Ziggy."
"When they shocked him before, Ziggy couldn't hold the lock. You almost lost him. And now it was starting to happen again," she wailed.
"I won't let him get lost, Donna. No matter what," he attested firmly. "Ziggy thinks this has to do with the guy in the waiting room. But she isn't sure yet. Sam magnafluxed with me. There's no reason to believe it couldn't happen again with someone else. It did get straightened out in the end."
She started consciously slowing her breathing, calming her racing heart at the same time. "I'm sorry for losing it, Al," she said softly.
"None of this is helping you sleep, you know," he said, bumping his shoulder into hers as they sat side by side.
She agreed, taking an allergy pill before she went back, to keep her from waking again in the middle of the night and starting her mind racing again. She lay under the covers, her arms wrapped around her own body, imagining her husband was there with her, holding her. The allergy pill was meager. The thought of Sam's comforting arms lulled her to sleep.
January 23, 1998
Stallion's Gate, Los Alamos, New Mexico
Donna sat alone in her office, doing her routine paperwork, while running yet another simulation on her computer. She was jittery. Was it too much caffeine, or was she just more worried than usual? Al had nearly patted her on the head and sent her on her way, something he rarely did. She knew Al filtered everything before it got to her, making every attempt to shield her from things that had the potential to upset her. He also knew her enough to know that she was strong, and capable, and not a fainting flower who wilted at the slightest puff of dismay.
Al knew how to balance in between, one of the many things Donna loved and appreciated about him. He was no coddler, and chose to tell her the truth as plainly as he could. But there were little things sometimes, minor details that he could have told her, but chose not to, when it served no purpose other than making her worry, or hurt, in any way. Donna had always suspected, maybe in an implied contract, that Al had promised Sam he would have taken care of her if something happened to him. In as much as she actually needed the care.
This time, something was up. Not wrong, necessarily. No danger or imminent death approaching. But up. As in Al knew something quite significant that he was not telling her.
She knew Sam had leaped into San Francisco in 1985, into a midde aged news reporter, and that Ziggy had predicted he was there to stop a serial killer. By itself, that would seem troubling. But after all this time, things like that she took in stride now. Things had certainly been worse.
Al had checked in right after Gushie had confirmed the positive neuron lock. She had heard him talking to Gushie, about the fact that the next victim was due to be murdered almost two weeks from the current leap time. And that she was a psychic, although Al had used what she would have described as air quotes, keying into his skepticism concerning the claim.
"What are we supposed to do with our guest? For two weeks?" Gushie asked nervously. "Has Dr. Beckett ever had to stay in the same place that long before?"
Al had shrugged it off, and then made a grumbling comment about giving him a few books to read.
The next day, she had been in the control room the second time Al had checked in. The voicelink was turned off, which she thought was odd, but she chose not to question it until it became a problem. He had shut it off in the past before as a way to protect his privacy, or to control a certain situation, and sometimes when Sam argued a lot with him, or his assessments, or Ziggy's ideas. Unable to listen to the chatter, she had instead monitored the data as it was processed.
Ziggy had started glitching, or "going blooey," as Al would sometimes say. The best indication she could see was the potential that Sam was trying to tell the psychic who he really was, a time traveler who just looked like Dylan Powell. Why would he risk something so dangerous? she thought.
"Gushie, override the voicelink," she said to him.
"--won't come back!" she heard Al, sounding frustrated and angry. Obviously berating Sam. It hadn't been that long ago she remembered Al recounting to her Sam saying pretty much the same thing to Al when he had been lying to Sam about Beth. The irony, she knew, was Sam had probably been deadly serious, while Al, no matter what he said, would never just walk away and leave Sam to his own devices. She knew, as close as they were, Al held Sam in the utmost esteem, while Sam remained forgiving of Al for his many misgivings.
He was still smoldering when he emerged from the chamber, but quickly tried to shrug it off when he noticed she was in the room. He smiled, and told her, "He thought she might be able to tell who is really is..." and gave a dismissive gesture.
But day after day had started to go by, and Al was nowhere near the imaging chamber. He checked with Gushie only once a day, confirming he was still where he thought he should be. Al gave no explanation whatsoever, and then eventually had seemed to avoid her. He hadn't come to her office, eaten lunch with her, even to ask her specific questions. She also checked in with Gushie, when Al wasn't there, to see if maybe he knew more than he was letting on.
February 2, 1998
Stallion's Gate, Los Alamos, New Mexico
"He was two weeks early, Donna. If Ziggy was right," Gushie explained.
"But he's been living there for all this time. Al hasn't talked to him once! Did they really get into an argument, and Al stormed out? I mean, seriously?" she asked.
"I...uh...I don't know...I mean...maybe?" Gushie stammered, wringing his hands like he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown.
"Al's avoiding me like the plague. I just want to know what's going on!" she vented in frustration. "Isn't the date of the killing tomorrow, leap time?"
"Yes...yes...I believe so."
"Is Al in his office?" she asked, turning like she was already headed there.
"I...uh...I...uh..." Gushie's incoherence only made her more suspicious.
Undeterred, she almost barged through the office door. "Al, this is crazy!" she announced. He regarded her with surprised, guilty eyes. "What is going on? Did something happen? Why haven't you talked to Sam?"
He waved the hand that held the cigar in front of her. "One at a time, Donna."
She took a deep breath, and asked the only question that really mattered now. "What are you hiding, Al?"
He sighed, imploring her with his eyes to drop the questions. "You don't want to know," he said with deadly earnestness.
"Is he all right?" she asked, unable to keep the edge out of her voice.
"Yes, yes. He is not in any danger. I wouldn't keep that from you, you know that," he assured her.
"Then what?" she sighed, then stopped short, watching his face set. She had seen that look before. When Al had told her about Sam and his piano teacher, when he had leaped into Ray Hutton.
Al noticed her face fall, shaking his head. "Damn," he swore under his breath.
A wave of nausea boiled up from her stomach. She knew, without further questioning, that her husband had become involved with another woman.
When it came to women, Sam and Al were polar opposites. Al had been married five times, divorced five times, and had countless other women he had been involved with from before she had met him to the present day. Tina, his current interest, had lasted a relatively long time, although they had been on again off again since Sam had first leaped. Al was easily impressed by physical beauty, and generally enamored with all things female. He could be a bit lecherous, even inappropriate at times. In the end, Donna understood from where Al's shortcomings originated, having witnessed the painful cause first hand.
Sam was, as Al so affectionately named him, a Boy Scout. He had parents who had taught morality by example, valuing honesty, integrity, respect and equality. He respected her in a way that was unique, valuing her beautiful mind before he ever told her her face or body were just as beautiful. He fell deeply in love with her before he ever contemplated being intimate with her. And once they were, it had always been a deeply emotional experience. Sam was internally appalled by Al's attitudes, though never outwardly judgmental towards his friend.
Regardless of his swiss cheese memory, she believed wholeheartedly that if Sam had become intimately involved with a woman, it was because he loved her. Sam loves her, whoever she is. When this had happened before, he hadn't known at that point he had changed history, unable to remember that he was already married to her. Donna had forgiven him without a qualm.
Hadn't Al said this psychic had known who Sam really was?
The thought froze her blood. Sam, not Sam looking like someone she loved, not Sam trying to help her fall in love with the aura of his person, just Sam. Her Sam, minus huge chunks of his memory and the full genius of his mind. Even after his relatively recent quantum realignment with her current reality, she had reluctantly accepted the fact the Sam Al interacted with during leaps wasn't exactly her husband. Without his memory of her, he was still different. His inner self, the deepest part that she knew, was the same. But just the thought that time traveling Sam had killed over ten people, something she could not fathom her husband could do, even if it was done to protect other people he loved.
He'll leap away when it's over, not remember that he ever knew her, that he ever felt anything at all, she told herself in an attempt to comfort herself. Just like he never remembers you, no matter where he goes. Always, the deepest of her wounds, despite her best attitude and her facade. And now, as she stood here in Al's office, trembling and sick, she knew that Sam was probably holding her, kissing her, telling her things about his life and his past, the things he could remember at least.
It was worse than before, so much worse. This woman saw her husband when she looked at him, not some stranger. Her Sam. Her mind started spiraling into blackness. Did he hold her shoulders when he was talking to her? Hold her face in his hands when he kissed her? Cradle her in his arms as he made love to her? She felt her stomach churn violently and pressed her hand over her mouth to keep from vomiting again. She turned away, taking slow, deep breaths, determined to not throw up in front of Al.
She felt Al staring at her, unsure of what he should say, she knew. So she broke the silence, saying, "He's in love with her." Not a question.
It's not his fault, she repeated in her head. And it wasn't. Did it make it easier that there was no one to blame? Just another unfortunate tragedy that made up the fabric of her life. She felt herself wonder, if he were suddenly back here again with her, if she could just be the same again, giving him absolution without a beat. Horror overtook her, once she felt for sure, no matter when it could ever be that he would be back here with her, that she would never be able to be alone with him like that, without feeling this specter in between them. The threads of connection that held them together, their quantum entanglement as he had reminded her, seemed weaker somehow, knowing this. She didn't have the slightest idea how to restore it, other than reminding herself that she loved him, and that nothing, absolutely nothing, would ever make her stop. For better or worse. The absolute desolation now inhabiting her heart, mind, and soul, was something new she had to contend with.
"Donna..."
"I won't make you say it, Al. I'm not wrong."
"He loves you, Donna. You. If I said your name to him, just once, he would remember how much. Even now, when he's with someone else. Hell, he is remembering you. How he feels about you, while he's with her. I know that isn't any consolation. I wish sometimes I could just tell him, but I know what he would feel if he suddenly did remember you. It would kill him if he knew how much he's hurting you."
I was thinking of you the whole time, she thought absurdly, knowing how little of a consolation it truly was.
"Sam would never hurt me, Al. Not on purpose," she assured herself, hating how unsure she sounded even to herself.
Al was thoughtfully silent. Finally he began again, "You know, when we leaped together?" She waited, her gaze fixed on him. "I remember almost nothing about actually being in 1945. But I have a clear memory of standing at the mailbox, right as we were mailing the letter, when he finally started to remember his life. I thought he was suffocating. But he told me he'd gotten it all back." He looked away, seeing something in his mind that disturbed him enough that he squeezed his eyes shut, as if he could block out the memory like a vision. "I have awful dreams sometimes, when Sam looks at me like he looked at me then. Betrayed, angry, for not telling him about you, about the way I always acted when I was with him, pretending he wasn't married. I had to look away from him."
"You could have told him then, that it was me. But you didn't," she said softly.
He shook his head. "A promise is a promise. It was easier for him to be angry at me, then angry at you. Especially when you took the brunt of everything else." He sighed, a ghost of a smile appearing. "You are right about him, though." He grinned quirkily, half of his mouth curling up. "One of the many reasons why he's a very lucky man, my dear. Your devotion is rare. Don't let this stuff wear you down."
She stuffed the sadness down, blocking it off as best she could, now with this rock sitting inside her heart that she feared would be with her always. "He asked me that when he was home. If he'd hurt me. Because he couldn't remember the things he might have done."
"Did you tell him the truth?" Al asked bluntly.
She wanted to argue with him, tell him he wasn't being fair. But the logic sounded flawed inside her head. Why tell him the truth? That he'd hurt her, when he couldn't have changed anything? Because he had no idea that I was here, loving him and missing him? She'd had him for several hours only that day. Should she have wasted it, lamenting her poor broken heart?
"I can't hurt him purposely any more than he could hurt me," she admitted. No matter how much it killed her on the inside.
December 3, 1985
Waikiki Beach, Hawaii
Donna is alone on her beach towel, Sam and Jim currently swimming in the ocean, and Thelma resting back at their house. She hears Katie huff as she sits down next to her.
"I forget sometimes how beautiful it is here, since I see it every day," Katie says wistfully.
"It certainly is beautiful," Donna agrees.
After a short pause, Katie says, "I know we were probably a lot to take in all at once, especially Jim. I hope you feel welcome despite it. We're really glad that you're here. That you're with Sam."
Donna senses the sincerity in the words. "I do, honestly. It's wonderful. I only have my mother. I'm an only child. This feels...right."
"He loves you, you know," Katie says softly.
"I know," Donna replies.
She feels Katie grasp her wrist. "No. I mean he really loves you. I could see him looking at you, when you didn't notice. I've never seen him look like that before. At anyone. Ever."
"I love your brother with all my heart, Katie. I do," she says earnestly, feeling the connection to this woman.
"My older brother used to talk to me about Sam all the time. It was really hard for him, growing up in a small farm town, with that brain of his. The farm kept him grounded, you know, so he had some semblence of normalcy. But he was alone a lot when he was growing up. He was shy, and he stuck out like a sore thumb in school. I don't think he ever felt like he belonged anywhere." Katie smiles. "He seems peaceful, when he's with you, if that makes any sense."
"It does," Donna says, warm inside at the thought. She looks up, seeing Sam approach the blanket as he walks up the sand. He is still dripping wet, his hair slicked back from his forehead. His skin is lightly tanned after three days in the sunshine. He smiles at her, shaking water droplets on her for fun as she squirms.
He sits down hard next to her, still smiling. With the force of a tidal wave, she feels her love burst forth, blooming in her chest like a flower. He is hers, she knows this, thanks God for this, resting her head on his wet shoulder.
February 28, 1973
Bethesda, Maryland
"Lieutenant?" he hears. He turns his head to see the nurse in his hospital room doorway. It is the only acknowledgment he offers.
He knows what this is, has known since he found himself aboard a military transport headed out of Vietnam. 1973, they had told him. He had tried his best to keep track of time, while he had been held in captivity. Six years. He had suspected a very long time, but six years had amazed him. And panicked him. How would anyone have waited six years, when they thought him dead, to move on?
The fact that the hospital counselors had initiated this only has served to confirm his fears. If she had been waiting, she would already have been here.
"Lieutenant Commander," he mumbles blankly, remembering they have promoted him in absentia.
"Yes, sir," she says softly. "I have...uh...someone on the line. It's being transferred from the main switchboard up to your line. I'm just coming to let you know."
As soon as she finishes speaking, the phone on his bedside table begins to ring. The last six years flashes before his eyes in an instant, a horror film he knows will always be there every time he closes his eyes until he is dead. With all this present, he is still more fearful to answer this call than anything he remembers. It is the death knell of his entire past and future, of his hopes and dreams. His lost salvation, though they all tell him now that he is saved, he is free. His prison no longer has sides or a lock, but it is still a prison. He lifts the receiver.
"Al?" he hears immediately, before he can speak. Her voice is like music, or the first sound in the newly healed ears of a deaf man. Even answering this simple thing, he hesitates. He wants to call her Honey, as he always has. But he knows, inside him, that she is not his any longer. He knows it. "Beth," is all he can manage, her name sounding strange out loud, though he has said it inside his head constantly for six years.
He hears her crying, unsure of all of the emotions involved in the process. "I couldn't believe it. When the Navy called me...after all this time..."
"Long time," he says stiffly, afraid that he will break down, and he has already told himself he will not.
More crying. He pictures her blue eyes, light as the sky. "It's...awful...what they said..."
He knows she can't put it into words, doesn't want her to try.
"I'm too hard to kill," he says humorlessly.
She cries, heaving sobs that break his heart anew. "Al...I..."
"I know," he says, clearing his voice as it hitches. He can't bear to hear her say it. "It was a long time."
It takes an eternity before she can say anything else, do anything else, but cry. "I was so...certain...that you were dead."
In that instant, he wishes it were true. He had come close, very close, in six years of hell, to wishing he would just die. So it would just end. But her face, her voice, the dream of her had kept him this side of the afterlife, for whatever it was worth now, which seemed like almost nothing. He remembers aiming for the canopy as his plane is falling out of the sky, best chance to soften his landing. Just a few hundred feet in either direction, and it would have long been over.
She must know, as he stays silent, what he is thinking. He hears a man talking in the background, and the sounds of a small child crying. A bomb explodes inside his chest, with the force of a nuclear detonation. Every wound he has ever had is now open and bleeding. He realizes he is listening to her life, that she has now because she has moved on from him. "I...uh..." she starts.
"It's all right," he says, knowing it isn't, at the same instant that he is giving her back to her new life. All he hears is her crying again, each breath he grows more numb, as he retreats deep inside himself. Something inside him begins to die at this moment, never to be resurrected again.
"Is there anything...I can do?" she finally asks.
Through the blizzard that has begun to rage deep within, and freeze everything into a nuclear winter, he finds his voice and says, "Be happy. Live your life."
He knows, by saying this, she will stay away. He cannot bear the thought of looking upon her, knowing she loves someone else, has a child with someone else. He hopes she believes that he has let her go, but he knows too, he has not, cannot, ever, let her go.
And the part he holds, he buries underneath the detritus that slowly accumulates as his dreams die a slow and uncomfortable death, bit by bit, day by day.
He knows, without a doubt, as he lies alone in his hospital room, that he has merely traded one hell for another.
