Aaron scowled as he looked back over his shoulder. That strange man was following them again. Aaron had been afraid he'd been a reporter at first, since there wasn't exactly a shortage of them stalking him and Ji Yeon ever since they'd both turned eighteen and were considered fair game.
"It's the eyes I think," Ji Yeon said, making Aaron jump a little.
"What do you mean?" Aaron asked like he didn't know. Those unblinking blue eyes...
"I can just feel him watching—it's weird."
"I don't think he's a reporter anymore, but what else could he be? He's got to be in his sixties or seventies so he'd probably be retirement age if he was a detective or something like that."
"Maybe he's one of those Oceanic/Ajira conspiracy nuts." Ji Yeon sounded like she didn't believe that herself, but if he wasn't any of those things what was he?
"So what do we do now? Keep ignoring him and hope he goes away?" Aaron asked hopefully.
Ji Yeon shot him a dark look, then pressed her lips together looking determined. "I'm going to talk to him."
Aaron blanched and grabbed her by the arm. "You can't! What if he really is some loon and he decides to hurt you!"
Ji Yeon's lips turned up at one corner. "Keep it up and I'll start to think you like me." She brushed his hand off and started to walk away.
Aaron scowled. Ji Yeon knew he liked her, and always had as long as he could remember. When he was a kid he would look through magazines his grandmother bought about the Oceanic Six, and read everything he could about the girl living on the other side of the world from the California home he grew up in. They'd finally met when Aaron was sixteen at a conference for the families of crash survivors, and the real thing was better than anything he'd ever read or made up. She'd moved all the way from Korea to be closer to him, so she probably was only teasing him and felt the same—Aaron hoped. He turned to follow Ji Yeon—whoever she was facing, it wasn't going to be alone.
Ben had a rolled up newspaper under his arm he didn't bother pretending to read. It made him even more conspicuous than he already was—everyone else had digital copies since paper was rarely used these days. Ben suppressed a smile as Ji Yeon turned around and strode towards him wearing an expression he'd seen on her mother's face all too often, and he finally let his lips curve up as Aaron followed her. Aaron's coloring was all Claire, but otherwise his build and the shape of his jaw were more like his uncle Jack's. Ben was glad to finally see them close up—it had taken them longer than he'd expected to act.
Ji Yeon didn't bother with pleasantries. "Who are you? Why have you been following us?"
"My name is Benjamin Linus, and I've been following you because your parents asked me to do so." And not to approach you, ever. Ben had always been good at playing the technicalities, it didn't count if they came to him.
"So he's crazy after all," Aaron mumbled and Ji Yeon elbowed him in the side to shut him up.
Ben raised an eyebrow. "Insanity would be a relief, actually, since penance isn't expected of madmen."
Aaron tried not to squirm as Ben stared at him calmly, waiting to see if he had any other comments. "Well, it's not like you could be telling the truth!"
Ben smirked. "No?" He pulled out a stack of Polaroids from his jacket pocket. "I'd like to know how you'd explain these then." Ben paused, narrowing his eyes at Aaron, then bypassed him completely to hand the photos to Ji Yeon.
Photography was a hobby of Ji Yeon's, so she took the pictures fully expecting to pick apart some badly computer simulated images—it wouldn't be the first time people tried to extort money from her family. Instead, she was so surprised she almost lost her grip on the photos and dropped them, one of her hands covering her mouth in shock.
"Ji Yeon?" Aaron put a hand on her shoulder.
"Look." It came out barely a whisper.
Aaron pulled the pictures out of the stunned, death-grip Ji Yeon had on them with a little effort and flipped through the pile. It was them—all of them. His birth mother, the one that raised him, his half-uncle Jack, both of Ji Yeon's parents, and others he'd read about but didn't remember ever meeting. They were older of course, but alive. Ji Yeon clung hard to Aaron's arm.
"Where is this place?"
"The Island." Ben made sure they could hear the importance he placed on such a simple name.
The truth was Aaron already knew about the Island through conversations his grandmother had never intended for him to overhear. He'd never believed it really, just another conspiracy theory from someone who should have known better, but it had turned out to be the truth.
"How...? Why would they leave us here alone?" Aaron was the one who said it, but Ji Yeon's miserable expression implied she was thinking the same.
Ben could have told them of how hard the Island was on parents and children, but thoughts of Alex hurt even after so much time had passed. "You'd have to ask them. I'm only a messenger."
"How would we see them to ask?" Ji Yeon said, tears in her voice but not in her eyes.
Ben's face lit up. He'd been exiled nearly a decade to keep watch over them, and the time had finally come to go home. "There's a boat at the marina. Look for a captain named Charles Hume. I'd pack heavily if I were you—return trips are rare to non-existent." Ben disappeared quickly like he'd never been there at all, leaving them standing there stunned.
"This is crazy..." Ji Yeon whispered, but meeting each others eyes they knew they both wanted the same thing.
Aaron tucked the pictures away for safekeeping and took Ji Yeon's hand. "Let's go, you're better at packing a suitcase than I am."
Ji Yeon smiled and squeezed his hand. It didn't matter what happened in the end, as long as Aaron was with her, Ji Yeon thought she could handle anything.
A/N: Hope you like this, I haven't done Aaron/Ji Yeon before. I'm not completely satisfied with it, but if I didn't stop now it never would have been posted in time for Christmas!