"Without music, life is a journey through a desert." - Pat Conroy
Chapter 7
His Addiction
"
Cold Turkey."
"What?" asked Al.
"
Cold Turkey. John Lennon. Tonight, Valentine's Day, 1995. I was working and listening to
Cold Turkey. And I was eating a cold turkey dinner. Suddenly, I thought of the irony."
"That you were eating cold turkey while listening to
Cold Turkey? A coincidence, but not ironic."
"No. See, the song is about addiction, right?" Sam said excitedly. "I realized, Project Quantum Leap had become my addiction. I knew I needed to drag myself away from it and go home, but it was like going cold turkey."
"That's...not really ironic either," muttered Al. "That's called an epiphany. Are you sure you're feeling okay?"
"Never better," Sam grinned, proud of his cherished new memory, fuzzy though it was. "Maybe this Leap will help me to remember more about my past."
Al said nothing, but he watched Sam suspiciously. It was one of the closest times his memories had crept toward Donna Eleese. She had come down to the facility that night and brought a plate of the turkey dinner she cooked for Valentine's Day, growing cold as Sam obsessed over his work.
She did not complain. She never did. She knew her husband had to get the last bits of programming in, time was growing short, and government bigwigs were getting impatient to see results. She brought the dinner and gave him a warning she knew he would not heed. Still, as his wife and a woman who worried about him, she had to give it anyway. Then she went back home alone. When Sam had his mind set on doing something, there was not much anyone could do to stop him. Donna knew this and still loved him. It baffled Al how that woman put up with him, and continued to wait for him after all these years of Leaping.
Sam had eaten the dinner mindlessly while he worked out the problem. Finally, he dragged himself away from the lab and went home to their ranch at Stallion Springs just in time to have dessert with Donna. The next day, he was back in the Control Room chatting with Ziggy when Al arrived, moaning with a hangover. Sam had "that look." Al had commented on it, purely to see Sam blush and run off to a computer terminal. Ziggy naively commented that Doctor Beckett's pheromone levels were unusually high. That was enough for Al to feel relieved that Donna had not only forgiven her husband for working late on Valentine's Day, but she still gave him a very special "present."
Did Sam remember any of that? By the innocent look on his face, Al assumed Sam still could not recall her. If he did, he would have that anguished self-loathing expression Al had seen with dread when they switched places and Sam suddenly got all of his memories back.
He could remember the dinner, but not the wife who cooked it! It frustrated Al at times. Keeping such a secret from his best friend was painful, but Donna often calmly and humbly assured him, it was for the best. Sam had to be able to act freely, and if he realized he was married, he might not be able to do what was necessary.
That woman was a saint! If Sam ever found his way back home again, Al would make sure he
never forgot that!
"That's the turnoff," Sam pointed.
Twelve miles east of the small town of San Antonio, a person comes across the first paved road leading off the highway with a small sign, 525 in a white circle upon a black square, with an arrow pointing to the right.
Highway 525.
WSMR P Route 7.
Stallion Gate.
The road to the Trinity Site.
The road to Project Quantum Leap.
It was inconspicuous, barely visible in the night. Five miles south of Highway 380 was Stallion Range Center. Seventeen miles past that, Trinity Site, where the world's first atomic bomb was detonated.
Sam's motorcycle slowed down. His eyes ventured off the road and into that impenetrable darkness. "I wonder how many times I've been down that road," he mused softly.
Al kept quiet. Sam's memory had already gotten uncomfortably close. It reminded Al just how dangerous of an area they were in. Screw running into Mafia hit men! If they were not careful, they might meet Donna on this road, heading either to the facility to bring the turkey dinner or traveling back to their little desert ranch. If Sam remembered her, Ziggy warned that it might unlock all of his memories. Such a neural overload would cause unpredictable behavior, especially regarding Project Quantum Leap.
Al realized Sam was right; that Project was his addiction. Al had to be his Serax.
"I wish..." Sam began, but his voice trailed off.
Al wondered, if Sam did try to break into the White Sands Missile Range, how exactly was he supposed to stop him? The most he could do was shout at him.
To Al's relief, Sam let the motorcycle creep past the turnoff. He watched it wistfully even when he had to look over his shoulder, but his face was firm. So close! Yet he had decided not to use time travel for personal gain. And really, what could he do? If he stopped the first Leap, he doomed all those lives he saved.
The Harley sped back up. The pointy mountain in the distance grew smaller behind them. Al let out a sigh that turned into a yawn. He felt so tired, but he could not leave yet. Every few minutes, Ziggy shouted at him so loudly, he was shocked Sam
couldn't hear that annoying hybrid computer.
"
Don't you dare fall asleep, Admiral Calavicci! This location is sensitive," Ziggy warned.
"I know, I know!" he shouted back. Damn that annoying voice! Ziggy could sound sultry at times, and other times the tone reminded Al of his second wife. Or was it his third?
"Know what?" Sam shouted back to him.
"Oh, nothing. Ziggy doesn't want me to fall asleep."
"Rough night?"
"You Leaped into Mr. Nyt no more than five minutes after Leaping out of that comic artist from Quebec. Remember, we were working on that case for at least eighteen hours straight. Now we're back, and I haven't slept in over a day." He afforded a loud yawn. "I'm getting too old to pull an all-nighter!"
"
As Tina Would say...suck it up!"
He really hated Ziggy right now.
"
Admiral, if Doctor Beckett is left alone, the odds that he will head straight for Stallion's Gate..."
"I know the odds, Ziggy!" yelled Al.
"Odds for what?" Sam shouted over the motorcycle's engine.
Al simply did not answer. He knew Sam too well. Ziggy might give odds, but Sam was not the sort to do something suicidal just to possibly change his own fate. Bless him, but Sam was almost
too noble. Even if this crooked lawyer did not deserve a second chance, Sam would do his damnedest to save him.
He trusted Sam, even if Ziggy didn't!
That was when they saw headlights in the far distance. It was east of them, not coming from Interstate-25, but still...
"Al? They couldn't know where I am, right? They couldn't have driven this way." Even Sam sounded uncertain but cautious. "There's nothing east of here, not for miles. It's just...a motorist, right?"
"I don't know, Sam."
Al's face crunched up. True, the odds of it being someone from the Mafia were next to zero. Al had not seen headlights behind them, and on the dark, flat desert, a following car would be visible for miles. Even if the people tailing them saw the Harley turn onto Hwy 380 and called in backup, there was no way a car from Carrizozo could have reached here so soon, even with the speed of an Italian car.
Still, there were other people Al did not want to come across who
might be on this road.
"Here, right here!" he shouted at Sam. "Pull off the road and kill your lights."
Sam swerved off the highway, shut down the headlights, and puttered into the small ghost town of Carthage, nothing more than some empty buildings of stone and adobe, abandoned for decades, a speck of a memory of civilization lost amidst the merciless desert. Carthage was the first coal mine in New Mexico, and it became the busiest coal mining camp in the state by 1889. The Santa Fe Railroad once ran nearby, but government issues caused the railroad to relocate, the mine closed, only to reopen in 1903. At one point, it boasted a population of one thousand people. Then the Great Depression hit, the country began going to gas and electric energy, and by 1950 the Carthage Fuel and Coal Company closed the mines...again, and for a final time. That precarious town quickly became an empty shell, abandoned, forgotten, a casualty of progress.
Al looked fondly at the site. In his time, Carthage had already been destroyed, torn apart by the government's so-called "desert restoration project." It peeved the workers of the Project to no end that the historic mining town that had withstood sandstorms, floods, coal dust explosions, and a nearby nuclear blast was finally demolished by a government tractor. It was nice to see the old town again.
Sam drove slowly to a well-hidden area behind a crumbling adobe building and turned off his engine. His ears rang with the sudden silence, and it took a while to adjust to the gentle noises of night insects. He glanced around, but the clouds hid the moon. There was no way to see what laid around him.
The car coming toward them slowed down. Although Sam crouched out of sight, Al freely walked forward, squinting into the darkness. The moon peeked out from the scuttling clouds to light the evening with silver, just long enough for Al to recognize the vehicle.
"Damn," he muttered.
"
Too late!" Ziggy perked in, sounding amused rather than horrified.
End of Chapter 7
A/N: You might notice that I called the Highway 525 turnoff "Stallion Gate." This is that geographical location's proper name. The series persistently called it "Stallion's Gate" (with a possessive apostrophe). Some fans theorize that Stallion Gate is the "publicly known" entrance to White Sands, while Stallion's Gate is a nearby top secret entrance. Conspiracy theories aside, I think Mr. Bellisario simply spelled it wrong and refused to correct it. Maybe no one pointed out the error until too late. Who knows! I personally believe Stallion's Gate is Stallion Gate, northern entrance to White Sands Missile Range. For this one reference, with Sam standing right in front of it, I'm using the proper name. All other references will have the possessive apostrophe.
"That comic artist from Quebec" references one of my favorite webcomic artists, Yan 'Kern' Gagné, creator of "Drowtales." I tossed that in for my own laughs. Thinking Sam Beckett inspired "Drowtales" is hilarious to me. Imagining Sam with a thick French Canadian accent makes me giggle! Again, I don't own Quantum Leap
or works by John Lennon. Mentioning song titles is legal.
