Chapter/Episode 4x01: Aftermath

No-one centric

"When are you coming?" asked Jack.

"We'll be there in a couple of hours," replied the voice from the other side of the SAT phone.

"Okay then, see you in a few hours."

Everyone was ecstatic at the radio tower. Jack had just finished calling the rescue boat. Jack scanned everyone's faces, they were all happy and hugging each other. It was a moment of joy and triumph for everyone, which they had not had since the day they crashed on the island. Jack had never seen these people so happy, atleast not on the island. He turned over to Kate and handed her the SAT phone and the Walkie-talkie.

"What's this about?" asked Kate smiling.

"I need you to have this in case they call again," replied Jack as he strapped on his backpack.

"Why are you giving me this? Where are you going?" asked Kate.

"I'm going to tie up a few loose ends," replied Jack looking at Kate affectionately in the eye, "and set a few things straight."

"You can't leave like-" Before Kate could finish the sentence Jack kissed her on the cheek. Kate blushed and stared at her for a few moments. She looked as Jack turned away from her to address the whole group.

"I want everyone's attention here for a minute, I am leaving to complete some work," he directed, "In the mean time Rousseau is going to lead everyone back to the beach. I want everyone to follow her and stay at the beach till the rescue comes."

"Where are you going?" asked Sun.

"I don't know," replied Jack, "It doesn't matter anyways. But I'll be back."

"What about him?" asked Rousseau pointing at Ben.

"Take him with you to the beach. Don't kill him. He might be useful later."

"See you all later," said Jack as moved towards the tree line and disappeared into the jungle.

Inside the Looking Glass Desmond stared at Charlie's dead body floating in the jamming room. Tears brimmed in his eyes. He was distraught; he did not even want to leave. It's all my fault, he thought, had I not told Charlie about these flashes he would have never thought to sacrifice himself like this. Desmond collapsed to the ground and started thinking about the good times he had with Charlie. He teared up once again. Suddenly Desmond heard footsteps, someone walking in from the other side of the station. Desmond did not even care to hide, if he died so be it. The person was wearing a dark elegant suit and a blue tie. It was Charlie.

"Hello Desmond," Charlie said.

"Charlie?" Desmond stood up in shock, "You di-"

"I'm dead, Desmond," Charlie said smugly, "You made a mistake."

"I'm sorry, brother. I tried to save your life but you cannot change the future and-"

"But you did change the future Des. And now every single one of us is going to die. You should have listened to what the ring lady said."

"Wha-"

"Stop moping Desmond you have to close this can of worms you just opened."

"I don't understand what you are-"

"Get out of this station; go back to the beach, right now," saying this Charlie stared walking towards where he came from and disappeared.

Danielle was leading everyone to the beach pulling Ben by his rope. Besides her was Alex who was looking at her from he corner of her eye.

"What?" asked Danielle.

"huh" stammered Alex.

"You have been looking at me like that for the past 8 hours that we've been walking. I thought you might have a question."

"uhm… yeah.. err... I wanted to know if Ben is my dad"

"Him?" Danielle shot a disgusted look at Ben, "No."

"Alex, listen to me," interjected Ben, "I'm sorry that I lied to you, but I need you to know that whatever I did, I did it for you. I did it to-"

"Shut up. I don't want to listen to anything you have to say," saying this Alex ran of to the back of the group along with Karl.

"Danielle," spoke Ben calmly, "You do know the reason we took Alex, don't you?"

"The only reason I haven't knocked you out yet is because I don't want to carry you. So unless you wish to have a gag in your mouth shut up."

A little behind them, Kate was walking with Claire and Sun.

"Claire, he is going to be okay. He turned the jammer off, that means he is ok," said Kate.

"You don't know that Kate. There was something about him when he left that didn't just feel right."

"I know this kind of stuff can be hard but you need to stop worrying."

"Can I have the Walkie-talkie?"

"Sure," said kate as she took the Walkie-talkie out of her pocket and handed it over to Claire.

Claire carefully handed over Aaron to Sun and took the Walkie-talkie from Kate. She pushed a button.

"Is anyone there?" she spoke.

"Hey, Claire this is Hurley," a ruffled voice came from the other side.

"Hurley, is Charlie back yet?"

"No, but I'm sure he's fine. Sayid said that he and Desmond probably decided camp somewhere else for the time being. They did not know if our plan worked or not so they must have decided to stay away from the beach in case the others were still here."

"Thanks Hurley," said Claire in a disappointed voice and handed over the Walkie-talkie to Kate.

"Hurley is Sayid there?" asked Kate.

"Yeah, I 'l get him," came the voice from the other side.

After a couple of minutes of silence Sayid came on the other side.

"Kate?"

"Sayid, did you see any signs of the rescue boat."

"No, none at all."

"I think something is wrong. They told jack that they'll be at the beach within 2 hours. It's been 8 hours now."

"I'm sure they are trying to lock our location, does Jack have the SAT phone on?"

"Jack is not here."

"What?"

"He left; he went towards the jungle just after making the call."

"And you did not ask him where he was going?"

"He wouldn't tell us. He said he'd be back soon."

"Well, lets hope so. Make sure you keep the SAT phone on. Sometimes it can take hours pinpointing the correct location through these phones."

"Okay. Is Sawyer there?" asked Kate hesitantly.

"Yes, he is on the other side drinking beer with Bernard. Should I call him?"

"No, don't," said Kate quickly, "We'll be at the beach in a few hours."

Locke sat down beside the flowing stream to rest for a while. He looked at his reflection in the water. Sunlight flowing through the cracks in leaves was shining on his face. His wound had almost disappeared. He looked frustrated. What do I do now? he thought as he threw a stone at the tree in front of him in anger. Just then he felt something hard and cold smack against the back of his head, he was knocked out.

Locke woke up. He slowly opened his eyes. At first everything was blurry but slowly everything started coming into focus. He was still in the jungle but now it was night. His arms were all scratched up. His shirt had blood on it. Everything around him was burning. Jack lay in front of him. He was bleeding badly his hands were burned. His face was pale as if all the life had been sucked out of him. He saw what looked like Desmond and Hurley carrying Claire and running off with urgency. There were screams all around the place. He could not make what any of them were saying. He stood up and moved towards Jack, Jack was barely breathing. Locke lifted him up in an attempt to carry him. Jack was bleeding badly, his chest was like it had had been pierced by several sharp swords. He managed to move Jack in the direction he saw Hurley & Desmond go. He heard the babbling of a water stream. There was a thick layer of black fog covering the island. Locke could also hear the thunder of clouds and see the occasional lightning. Carefully avoiding all the fires he moved across the tree line in front of the stream. But there was no water there. It was a black liquid in which bubbles were popping. Across the stream Boone was standing unaffected by all the chaos around him.

"You're not supposed to be here John, you have to follow your path that was a-"

Before he could complete the sentence a large ball of fire fell from the sky into the flowing black liquid. Locke jumped out of the way into the surrounding trees to avoid it. Jack and Locke both lay on the ground now. Locke saw clouds of fire rising on the horizon. He tried to look for Boone but he was nowhere to be found. Jack was now breathing heavily. He turned his head and looked at Locke.

"Locke," he mumbled, "You shouldn't be here."

"Jack," Locke asked, "What the hell is going on here?"

Jack laughed at the question " 'What's going on here?' That's the question isn't it John?"

Jack tried to get up but fell down. "Locke," he said panting "I want you to kill me."

"What?? No… you're not in the right state of mind-"

"I'm in a damn right state of mind!" yelled Jack, "I let all of this happen. All of our people are god knows where. Look at me, I'm barely alive. I can't live like this John. Put me out of my misery. If you can't then give me your gun"

"Jack, whatever happened here, we're gonna get through it. You're the last person who should be giving up. Now tell me what is happening?"

Jack did not reply he just fell unconscious. Frustrated Locke hit the ground hard. He looked at the sky with frustrated eyes. What am I supposed to do? Why am I here? Then he noticed a large ball of purplish light in the sky, the light was growing bigger and bigger until he realized that it was falling down.

"Jack move!" he screamed as he jumped out of the way to avoid the falling light.

Locke opened his eyes again. This time it was day. He did not have any scratches on his arms; he did not have any blood on his shirt. Scorching sun shone down on his eyes. He was lying besides a large tree. He could hear the chirping of birds which sounded like Beethoven after the nightmare he had just gone through and in front of him stood Jack. Unscathed, unscratched and without a single drop of blood on him.

"Hello, John," he said as he pointed a gun at Locke's head.

"What are you doing, Jack?" asked Locke.

"Why?" roared Jack.

"Why? What?"

"Why did you kill her?" asked Jack as he brought his gun right to Locke's head. His eyes were full of rage. "Why did you kill Naomi?"

"She represented nothing but trouble," said Locke in a matter of fact way.

"Oh yeah? And how do you know that?"

"The island told me."

"The island told you to kill that woman huh?" remarked Jack sarcastically.

"The island to me to do whatever was necessary to stop you from calling that ship," snapped Locke as he stood up, "Obviously, I failed."

"No John I failed. Today, you crossed the line. I should have dealt with you long ago, the day Boone died because of you-"

"Boone was the sacrifice that the island-"

"SHUT UP!!" yelled Jack at top of his lungs as he held the gun even more tightly.

"Let me ask you a question Jack," queried Locke, "Why are you so afraid?"

"Afraid, huh?"

"Yes Jack afraid. You're afraid of this place. It defies your reasoning. It challenges your belief. You know that this place is magical. You know we were brought here by fate. Isn't that why you want to leave so badly?"

"There is no such thing as fate or magic." screamed Jack.

"48 hours ago, I was lying in a ditch full of rotting carcasses unable to move my legs, with a bullet shot through me. And now I'm standing in front of you looking you eye to eye. How do you explain that, Jack?"

"Well John, I don't know about the ditch but you're soon gonna have a bullet shot through you again." Jack knew that he wasn't going to kill Locke, he was going to knock him out and take him to the beach camp so that he could keep an eye on him to make sure he does not create any further problems. Just then Jack heard a clicking sound, the sound slowly got louder until he saw a large calm of black smoke emerging from the row of trees in front of him.

"Jack run!!!" saying this Locke ran off. Jack followed him, jumping over the broken trees avoiding all the leaves that brushed his face as he ran. His heart thumping against his chest like it was about to burst out. Jack was too busy running even to look back to see if he had broken away from the monster but he could still hear the sound of trees ripping apart behind him. Suddenly Locke turned left for no apparent reason. What's he doing? Thought Jack in his head. But he nevertheless followed Locke. Locke was running about 7 feet ahead of from him. Jack noticed that this part of the island was different; the trees were much larger. They blocked sunlight making it feel like night. The path jack was running on was clear with not a single bush on it. Jack and Locke were running side by side now. Suddenly they emerged out of the darkness of the jungle. Jack felt his stomach sink, he didn't realize what was happening, he had a sensation that the earth has been pulled from under his feat. Then it all started to sink in; he was falling, he was falling into what looked like a cliff. He looked down and infact he was falling. Jack closed his eyes as his body accelerated towards the bottom of the cliff, he saw himself as a kid getting beaten up by the school bully, then he had a flash of his dad drinking, then him getting his medicine degree, he saw a flash of him doing his first surgery, then he saw quick flashes of Sarah on her wedding, Kate sewing up his wound, Juliet kissing him, then, finally he saw himself at the lying at the bottom of the 200 feet deep cliff in a pool of blood.

As Desmond was about to leave the looking glass through the moon pool he heard a groan. It was Bonnie she was still alive. Desmond moved up to her.

"Help me, please" she groaned.

"And why would I do that?" asked Desmond.

"Because, you're a good person and if you help me I could tell you everything about what Penny has been doing since you left. I know another way to contact her."

A/N: This is my first fan fiction. Hopefully it doesn't suck. If you can, please review. I will be posting the second chapter soon.