Message-Id: <199308261534.AA28784@dirt.cisco.com> Date: Thu, 26 Aug 93 10:31:13 CDT From: Gina Goff Subject: "Afterimage", part 11 "Afterimage" by Gina Goff Part Eleven Sam sat down on Maxine's bed as Admiral Calavicci closed the door behind him. _This is ridiculous,_ Sam thought. _It's only Al; he isn't really going to hurt me. I've been in dozens of situations a lot worse than this. So why is my stomach turning over and over? He doesn't even look angry._ _Maybe it's because he doesn't look angry. I know better than to trust that carefully blank expression. Whatever he's thinking, I'm not going to like it. Come on, Al. Say something. Do something. Get it over with._ The Admiral sat down next to Sam and looked at him silently for another interminable minute. Then he sighed and said, almost sympathetically, "What am I going to do with you?" _Nothing, I hope._ "I'm sorry, Daddy. I know I should have stayed in the chair like Mommy said." The Admiral frowned slightly, giving Sam the feeling that he'd somehow said the wrong thing. _I only admitted I disobeyed Beth. He already knew that. What was I supposed to do, deny it?_ "I got an interesting phone call today, right before I went to Ruthie's school. It was from a doctor in Albuquerque." "Are you sick?" _Why is he telling me this?_ "No. I took your Uncle Sam to see him yesterday. I asked the doctor to take a blood sample from Sam and run a DNA comparison with a Band-Aid I took off your knee. The samples matched." _Oh, boy. What do I say?_ "I don't understand, Daddy." "Sam." The Admiral's voice was gently chiding. "I know. Don't lie to me." _Help._ "It worked, Sam. The Project worked. I can hardly believe it." "How'd you find out, Al? When did you find out?" "Saturday afternoon. You tied one of your shoes." "I did?" "Yes, and that was the problem; you did it without thinking. Maxine can't tie her shoes yet, and even if she could, she'd have to really concentrate. Let me tell you, Sam, you scared the hell out of me when you did that. And then Saturday night, when you grabbed that rubber duck, I knew... I knew it wasn't Maxine, and I started thinking it might be you. And it was. Why are you here?" _Uh..._ "I cut a deal with Maxine. I take her baths and she lets me have her allowance." "I thought it had something to do with Ruthie. Surely you didn't go out on the playground for no reason." "No, I didn't. Ruthie... would have hit her head on the pavement if I hadn't been there." _Oh, my God, I must be responsible for that. Al was late getting to the school because he knew I wasn't Maxine. If he'd gotten there just a few minutes earlier, he would have seen Michael talking to Ruthie and saved her himself._ "So you saved Ruthie's life." "Yes." "And while you happened to be in the neighborhood, you decided to change the design for the Project." _Oh, boy, now we're really screwed. How do I get around this one?_ "Sam, I can see you trying to think up a lie. Don't bother. You put those notes in my briefcase yesterday, didn't you?" Sam hesitated before admitting, "Yes. Does he know?" "Not yet. And I'm not sure I'm going to tell him. If he found out the Project had actually worked, he'd go all out to get it on-line as soon as possible. And he's doing too damned much already." _This could be your big chance, Sam. Don't blow it._ "I remember. The only time I ever went home to sleep was when you made me do it. Sometimes I think... maybe you should have kept me on a shorter leash." "You do?" Sam shrugged, then nodded. The Admiral eyed him closely and said, "It's important, isn't it?" Sam reluctantly nodded again. Admiral Calavicci thought about what sort of trouble Sam might be hinting at. "I'm not supposed to ask, am I?" "No. You're not even supposed to know I'm here." The Admiral thought for another minute, then nodded briskly. "Right. You're supposed to be taking a nap." "Al! I didn't mean *I* need more rest. I was talking about *him*." "And when did you write up those calculations?" "Friday night. And Saturday night." "When you should have been sleeping. Go on, lie down." Sam resisted mildly, then allowed himself to be tucked in. "Al, this isn't necessary..." "Quiet, Sam. You take your nap like a good little quantum physicist, and I'll try to sneak you a beer after supper." Sam grinned, until the Admiral added, "It'll give us a chance to talk about how and why you've broken half the rules you made about leaping." As he slept, Sam recovered one last memory of his visit to Al's Place. "Why me?" he asked the bartender. "Why not you?" "Well, I have all this education -- a Nobel Prize in physics, even. Some people would say I should still be doing physics, that it's a waste for me to... be the clean-up crew." "What do you think?" "I don't know." "I think you've been enjoying yourself, and don't want to admit it." "Enjoying myself? I never get to relax. I never know who I am or what I'm supposed to be doing. And I end up in the most humiliating situations." "Don't you think somebody with a Nobel Prize in physics is big enough to handle a little humiliation now and then?" "That's not the point." "Then tell me this, Sam. When you were a kid, what did you want to be when you grew up?" "I don't know... a farmer, like Dad. A basketball player, like Tom. A lot of things, I guess." "Most kids want to be a lot of different things. But their choices are limited by their abilities. That wasn't a problem for you. You've got all those degrees. So why are you a physicist?" "I had to choose something... one thing. I wanted to do everything. But there wasn't enough time." "There is now." "Sam! Sam, wake up." "Al? Al, he knows." "Who knows what?" "Calavicci knows I'm not Maxine. He saw me tie my shoes." "Aw, Sam, why'd you do a dumb thing like that?" "I didn't do it on purpose, Al. But I think it's going to be okay; I sort of hinted that he needs to make the other Sam take it easy. Why don't you ask Ziggy to check the odds?" Al consulted the handlink. "You're not going to collapse anymore, but I thought that was because I fixed it." "*You* fixed it? How?" "Well, I had a little talk with Dr. Beckett." "You *what*? Al, are you cra... Al, there's blood on your clothes." "I know. That's what I came here to tell you. Maxine fell and cut herself. The little monkey talked Gooshie into letting..." "On the arm? Does she have a cut like mine?" "Yeah. Which means..." "Al, I'm gonna leap." "Come home, Sam. Promise me you'll come home." "I pro..." Sam said, before vanishing in a flash of blue light. Al was pacing back and forth in the Waiting Room when Dr. Beeks found him. "It's been three days, Al. Go home. We'll call you as soon as he leaps." "I want to be here when he arrives. He said he'd come home. He promised." Verbena voiced the question he'd been silently torturing himself with. "But did he say when?" The End