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It seemed funny to Sam that ever since Al’s Place, he’d been able to keep track of his leaps. For instance, he’d leaped roughly four hundred times since his birthday in that mining town, when he first learned he could take charge and influence his destiny. He didn’t remember all the details of each leap. He’d met about six thousand people, in about three hundred different towns. He couldn’t possibly remember every detail, no matter how excellent his fully functioning memory was said to be. It was just too much for one man to retain, and without Al and Ziggy to keep track for him, Sam found himself trying his hardest to remember it all for himself, which was almost completely fruitless. The only thing his memory was really good for anymore was reminding him how much easier this all used to be with Al by his side to help him solve everything.
In the beginning of his last four hundred leaps, after the ease of righting Al and Beth, Sam had been surprised at just how rough it was to go his path alone. Leaps that once took a couple of days were suddenly taking a week or more to correct without Al’s guidance and assistance. It didn’t help that Sam was now leaping body and soul, for the first time with his own face. On more than one occasion, Sam found himself unable to explain himself or where he’d come from. He’d called upon past leaps- names and faces and histories he could appropriate to get the job done while minimizing questions. More often than not, he simply went by Al Samuels- a constant reminder of why, and for whom, he’d continued leaping when he was told he could quit any time in that bar. Sam had taken his role as actor to new heights, adding improv to the mix out of sheer necessity. He didn’t like the lying, but when it lead to wrongs becoming rights… well, the ends justified the means.
He had no concept of time any longer. No idea how many years four hundred leaps must be. But he could tell from his reflection that it was long enough for him to have aged considerably. He wondered how old Al must be now. Sam was sure the Project had died at least two hundred leaps ago. It and he would be all but forgotten at this point. At least by the sponsors and everyone else not directly involved. He wondered if Donna had moved on and found some way to be happy without him, with someone else maybe. He wondered how old Sammy Jo must now be. Mostly he wondered about Al. What were he and Beth like together? Sam had memories- new ones layered over old ones- that entered his mind after he left Beth that second time. He recalled years of happiness and children growing, replacing the alcoholic mess that filled the beginning of Sam and Al’s friendship. Al’s reputation as #1 Womanizer was replaced by #1 Daddy in Sam’s mind. And in spite of everything, Sam still knew he and Al loved each.
The odds of Al’s new path even colliding with Sam’s, in order for them to create Project Quantum Leap together in the first place, should have been statistically infinitesimal. Yet, even as a scientist, Sam realized that Al’s and his relationship was written in the stars; no matter what, it was meant to happen. Like Holmes and Watson, Kirk and Spock- Sam and Al just always needed one another’s friendship.
Now, as Sam rematerializes in a haze of blue light (he’s still never seen it happen to himself, but he’s fully conscious of the tingly, crackling feeling it creates along his skin now that he travels bodily as well) for the four-hundred and first leap, he’s struck for the very first time by how bone-weary he feels. Sure, some leaps are more taxing than others, but Sam’s never felt run down like this before. It catches him so off guard that he’s not sure what’s going on. He momentarily forgets to check his surroundings.
Luckily, it seems dark enough so that anyone who might be near definitely couldn’t have seen him suddenly pop in. Still, the room he’s in makes Sam suddenly feel eerily on edge. The hairs on the back of his neck stand on end and he fights off a shiver.
“Sam?”
Sam spins around; startled that he was wrong about his visibility. Suddenly, he’s face-to-face with a familiar, if even more wrinkled, face.
“Al?”
The older man’s wide eyes seem to glow in the limited light streaming through the entrance to the room. Al reaches out a shaking hand uncertainly, poking his fingers into Sam’s bicep before gripping Sam’s arm.
“God, it’s really you?”
Sam doesn’t realize he’s choked up as well, until he tries to respond around the painful lumps of emotion welling in his chest and throat.
“Jesus, Al,” escapes on a sigh as Sam pulls the older man to him, engulfing him in a lung-crushing hug. “It’s so good to see you again. Where are we?”
“Fuck, Sammy,” Al, barks out on a laugh, clutching Sam just as tightly as Sam clutches Al. “You’re in the deactivated project accelerator. We just lost all our funding. I’ve been trying to find you and get you home for nine years now.”
Sam pulls back, holding Al a little less than an arm’s length away. “Nine years?!” Sam lets out a barking laugh of his own.
“It’s December 24th, 2009, Sam.”
Sam dissolves into laughter once again.
“Home on Christmas eve?”
“Donna’s gonna absolutely faint. And Beth is going to become insufferable about her ‘Christmas miracles’ theory as soon as she sees you,” Al laughs heartily.
After a moment, Al sobers up once again, eyes glistening as he stares up as Sam.
“I can finally thank you,” he whispers hoarsely.
Sam tries desperately to swallow around the choking emotion in his throat.
“Seeing you here is all the thanks I need, buddy,” Sam assures Al, squeezing Al’s arm once again. A moment passes while they both stare steadily at one another, taking stock of one another’s features for the first time in nine long years.
Al tries to discreetly clear his throat, pulling out of Sam’s clutches to covertly wipe away a few escaping tears.
“Come on, now. Beth’s dying to see you again. And Donna. God, they’re all gonna be so surprised when I return to the Christmas party with you in tow. It wasn’t much of a party with the prospect of never seeing you again hanging over everyone, so absolute this time…” He turns, dragging Sam by the arm out of the accelerator doors, only stopping to ask, “You’re not here in passing again, are you?”
Sam thinks for a moment, taking stock of just how tired he’s felt until Al spoke to him for the first time in so long, before clapping Al’s shoulder. This didn’t feel like just another leap. It felt too much like the calm following the end of a grueling experiment in one of this labs- there was finality.
“I’m definitely here to stay, Al. Wild horses couldn’t drag me away again.”
Without another word, Sam throws his arm across Al’s shoulders, stepping out of the world of leaping, and back into the world of reality, with his best friend once again at his side.