Impossible
By Hold-Out Trout
Disclaimer: I don't know just who owns Sliders at the moment, but it isn't me. Oh, that it were, and that I had the power to change all sorts of events in season three/four!
Author's Note: I actually watched Sliders when it was on TV, although I didn't watch it from the beginning, exactly. Let's just say that I truly owe my obsession with all things Quinn/Jerry O'Connell to Gwen. I owe a lot of obsessions to that girl, actually. I just bought and watched the whole first and second seasons on DVD while I was sick with a flu-like illness, and remembered exactly why I liked the show in the first place. Then I remembered the whole "Wade gets taken by the aliens (Kromaggs) to a breeding camp to explain the actress leaving the show" thing, and I became sad. So I had to write fanfic to make up for it. This is an alternate universe fic set after that. It ignores a great deal of material that comes before it, too, I'm sure, since I haven't watched the third season yet. I'm broke or I would have bought it already, believe me. I hope you enjoy my little fic--poor Wade gets tortured a little, but on the whole I think she gets off easier than in the series.
Their first kiss, Wade remembered, hadn't been until the world was ending. She kept forgetting that her first kiss with Quinn had actually been with his double.
Wade was forgetting a lot these days.
Her latest rescue from the Kromagg breeding camp seemed to be lasting quite a while. She couldn't remember any other time she had been to so many worlds, or any other time Quinn had acted so much like himself.
The first rescue, she suddenly remembered, had only lasted two days. They had crashed into the camp, opened her cell, and they slid out of there into a Paradise world.
Wade had known something was wrong. Paradise worlds were a dead giveaway that something was wrong.
She hadn't listened to herself, though, and so when it all crashed down, she was horrified at what finally happened, thinking it to be reality—what had happened? Was that one of the times Quinn had died? Had the Kromaggs found them and killed them all? Or was that first time the first time Quinn had—
She forgot that, again. That had never happened.
It was a trick, she learned. That, she never forgot, although for a while she kept hoping, each time she was rescued, that this time was for real.
Now, she knew this was just the latest Kromagg attempt to break her soul further. It was the best one yet.
No Paradise world, for a start.
Also, Maggie was still there. The Kromaggs knew she didn't like Maggie, so they'd tried a couple of scenarios where she died, or left. Wade never quite believed those. She didn't quite believe this one, either, partly because she knew better, and partly because Quinn didn't seem enamored of this Maggie. That, she thought, was a little optimistic.
This time, they slid often, dashing through the worlds, never heading home, sometimes being chased. The chasing wasn't new. The Kromaggs had quickly figured out that Wade would reject the easy escapes, so there were usually chases.
Whether or not they were real, these escapes were entertaining, a break from the terror of her cell. At least until the Kromaggs woke her up or until someone was killed or until Quinn raped her.
No.
She'd let the words out. But they weren't real. That never happened. The words hung in front of her closed eyes. Flashes of false memories played behind them.
No.
That never happened.
It couldn't.
And that was the one thing Wade was sure of, so it was the one thing she could always forget.
She didn't think the Kromaggs had realized that, or they wouldn't have kept trying. Or maybe they had realized. This Quinn, at least, seemed more or less normal. Except for not liking Maggie. And Wade could forgive that.
So Wade went along with this escape. She noted, from a distance, that Remmy and Quinn and sometimes even Maggie gave her concerned looks when she talked about worlds she'd only been to in her mind. She didn't talk about what the Kromaggs were doing—she knew it would just ruin the illusion of escape, or that one of the Sliders might try to convince her that this time was for real.
She might even believe them. That had happened a couple of times, and they had been the worst. Because Wade hadn't quite given up hope of a real rescue, and part of her wanted to be convinced.
So she couldn't let these rescuers know she didn't believe in them. She might shatter at the end of this escape, and Wade liked the little bit of sanity she had left.
So she slid from world to world, waiting for dusk to come and take the illusion of freedom away, but unwilling to let it come any sooner than necessary.
Which is why she now pushed herself out of Quinn's arms, Quinn's kiss.
Impossible.
Not possible.
Impossible, it reminded her that this was just a dream.
She pushed him away, noting with a grudging respect his hurt eyes. They weren't overdone, this time.
If this had been real, it would have been their fourth kiss, she thought. As an illusion, it was one of hundreds. As a fantasy, one of thousands.
"Wade," he tried.
She struggled to remember it was a dream. It was always hardest when he tried to coax her to believe, whether he knew she didn't or not.
He tried again. "Wade."
No. Impossible.
"Nothing's impossible."
She hadn't said it out loud. She was almost sure she hadn't. She was almost sure he had.
An infinite number of worlds.
World upon world.
Chance after chance.
It was hard to believe in impossibilities after Sliding.
How long since this rescue?
"Two years, three months."
This time, she thought she might have really asked.
Two years, three months.
"Wade."
Two years, three months.
"Talk to me."
Two years, three months. The longest by far. Second longest was…eight months, she thought.
"Please."
Such a long time, she thought. Too long. But if she believed, it might just disappear. Yes, they would want her to believe. Then she would break, and they would have her soul.
Silence.
It's too late.
"What's too late?"
Silence.
"What happened to you, Wade? You've never said."
Finally, the trick.
"What trick?"
She figured it wasn't going to last much longer, anyway. She might as well tell him. She did, leaving nothing out, not even the things she didn't remember.
She finished.
"So you see, this is just a trick."
But she didn't believe that, she found. Especially when Quinn smiled at her. It made no sense, since the Kromaggs had to know that it made no sense to smile at this story.
"Why are you smiling?"
"Because you are such a liar. 'I don't believe in you, Quinn. None of it's real, Quinn. You don't like Maggie, Quinn. You kissed me, Quinn.' As if that proves anything." His sarcasm made her flush.
"You've believed this from the first moment I showed up—I really showed up—two years, three months ago."
Wade shook her head.
"Yes, you did. And you want to know how I know?"
She just looked at him.
"Because the first thing I said to you was 'Let's go home.' And then you said, 'Who cares about home, Quinn Mallory?'"
Wade thought a moment. It was true, she realized.
"But how," she said, "did I know?"
He kissed the top of her head.
"Who cares," he murmured, "about how, Wade Welles, as long as you know?"
It was, she thought, a very good point. But it was still going to drive her crazy.