Chapter One
Disclaimer: I do not own Supernatural or LOST.
On the first night after their plane had crashed into the ocean, after everyone had settled down from the shock and finally began to take into account their dire situation, a survival count had been made. Sam couldn't even recall who the person had been, at the time, that had suggested and carried out the task, but that person had managed to look past the fatalities of the day and confirm their group at twenty two people that remained alive. Twenty two people that had entered a plane, in Australia, as strangers and had exited amidst chaos and death that were expected to survive together and collectively find their way back to civilization.
It had been forty five days on the island and not only were they no sooner to finding a way back to the real world, but their group number had also been cut in half. More than half. They were, officially, down to six people and the discovery of the morning could have very well shaved that number down even further.
"Where could he have even come from?" Sam asked out loud as he shook his head ruefully and narrowed his eyes towards the wall of bamboo. The same wall of bamboo in which he and Eko had tied up an unknown and unconscious man in an effort to watch him closely until they could determine if he was hostile or not.
Sam had never been in such an aggravating situation in his life, where the air was constantly tinged with fear while the unknown was thrown at them time and time again. Even hunting the supernatural didn't twist his stomach around like this. Normally he had researched whatever nasty thing his dad had found down to the letter and while there had been plenty of injuries during his life, he always felt confident that the Winchester men would prevail. It was that same assurance that had made his decision to leave for college so easy.
Now, though? Now, the only thing that he knew for sure was that this man had washed up on shore while Cindy and Libby had been attempting to catch more fish to feed their group. The how and why were still evading him and probably would until the man regained consciousness.
"That man is unconscious and rather than help him out, we just go and tie him up. Does anybody else think this is too drastic?" Libby mused out loud as she fixed him with a sympathetic gaze. Sam tilted his head from side to side as he carefully considered her question. He'd be lying if he said that he hadn't thought the exact same thing, especially with the uncomfortable position of the man's limp head as it hung against his chest. He really didn't seem to be a threat to them at all.
"When you take into consideration that he could have been planted on the beach in order to take someone else from our group," Ana Lucia sniped sarcastically. "No, I don't think this is drastic at all."
Twenty two people down to six, Sam thought with a wince. He stomped down his feelings about the man's comfort and readily conceded to Ana Lucia's point. Based on the two attacks they had suffered before their group had retreated away from the beach, there was no telling what the people already on this island were capable of.
"Ana Lucia, he's unconscious," Libby argued.
"Yeah, and we all thought that Goodwin was just another regular passenger on our doomed plane," Sam gently reminded her.
Libby opened her mouth and closed it again as Ana Lucia shushed them both vehemently. She pointed across the clearing to the captive man as he let out a painful groan. "I think he's finally waking up."
Sam turned and watched with rapt interest as Eko stepped up close to the man and observed him closely for several minutes as the man struggled to lift his head from his chest. "You guys don't think that Eko's gonna do anything too rash, do you?" Libby asked.
Eko waited until the man was able to lift his head up completely and hold it up before he reached forward and tugged down the blindfold that Sam had tied over the man's eyes as a precaution. Sam watched as the man kept his gaze on the ground for several moments before he looked up at Eko and allowed a grimace to twist up his features. Sam could easily see the confusion and fear on the man's face that he tried to hide underneath disdain as his grimace became a sneer. There was no way this guy had been planted on the beach, not with the genuine fear and surprise on his face.
"Who are you?" Eko asked him slowly. The confusion on the man's face grew exponentially as Eko moved closer to him. "Where are you from?"
The man continued to sneer up at Eko before he opened his mouth and spoke quickly and decisively in a foreign language. "Korean," Sam muttered as he shook his head in disbelief. He shared a pointed look with Ana Lucia before he turned away from the scene and crossed arms across his chest. "Does anybody have any clue what he's saying?"
Ana Lucia rested her hands in her jean's back pockets and shrugged around a sigh. "Sorry, but my specialty is English and broken Spanish."
"Well, I don't know about the rest of you, but this has to mean that he isn't dangerous, right?" Bernard asked as he stopped next to Ana Lucia. "The man doesn't even speak English."
"That doesn't mean anything," Ana Lucia argued vehemently.
Sam weakly nodded his head in agreement as he realized that he was still torn down the middle regarding this man's intentions. How could he not be? After everything that their group had gone through, even he had to admit that it was safer to be overly cautious than casual about something as strange as a man washing up on the beach of the island they were stranded on. "Ana, we found him in the water…unconscious," Cindy reminded her carefully.
"Yeah, you did," Ana Lucia agreed. "But, he also has a broken handcuff on his wrist." If they were to be honest with themselves, there were a million and one reasons that each of them could think up that would confirm that this man was bad news. However, there were probably also several reasons why he wasn't.
"I am not sure that he's actually a threat," Eko admitted as he walked back towards them and stopped in front of Sam. He leaned most of his weight on his handmade cane before he shrugged at Ana Lucia's murderous expression.
"See?" Libby gestured to Eko.
Ana Lucia allowed her features to soften as she dropped her eyes to the ground and evenly breathed in and out several times in an effort to calm herself down. "Look, away from this island…in real life, I'm a cop," she informed them openly. "Maybe it would be in our best interest if I ask him a few questions before we all decide to release him and give him a humanitarian medal."
"That'd be a great idea, if it weren't for the whole language barrier," Sam pointed out. Ana Lucia scrunched up her nose at the reminder that their captive didn't seem to speak English before Sam let out a frustrated sigh. He glanced over his shoulder at the man in the hope that something better than playing a crude version of charades would spring to his mind as he saw the man struggling against his bonds.
"You tied his ropes tightly, right?" Sam asked Eko as he nodded over at the man.
"Yes, he will not be going anywhere unless we release him," Eko stated plainly. Sam nodded sagely and glanced back over at the man as he stopping struggling long enough to compose himself and then jerked away from the bamboo wall…hard. A loud crack hissed through the clearing as the branch Eko had tied his hands to snapped away from the rest of the wall. The man didn't even take a moment to be amazed that he was free before he took off back towards the beach where he had been found.
"Shit, he's loose!"
Ana Lucia and Eko spun around and took off after him on the path towards the beach with Sam hot on their heels. It had been a stressful month and a half for all of them, but Ana Lucia had taken every attack and abduction personally. She blamed herself, and as a result, she refused to allow the remaining members of their group to be subjected to the same fate. Sam knew if that meant the direct incapacitation of this man before they knew if he was a threat or not, just because he MIGHT be a threat, then so be it.
Sam couldn't let that happen. He wouldn't let that happen.
He could smell the salt in the air intensify with each step that brought them closer to the beach and a solitary thought invaded his mind. Was it just a coincidence that this man was running back to the exact location where he had been found or was he deliberately leading them into a trap?
"Michael! Sawyer!" Sam heard the man yell as he rounded a corner right in front of Ana Lucia. All three of them followed in time to watch him leave the cover of trees and kick up sand as his feet connected with the beach and he continued to run.
"Jin!" another voice yelled back in surprise.
"He's not the only one on the beach," Sam hissed against the burning in his lungs as the information spurned Ana Lucia to run faster and break away from him and Eko. "His people are waiting for us," she yelled back at them over her shoulder as she exited the trees and stopped at the edge of the beach for Sam and Eko to catch up to her.
"Others! Others!" The man yelled out, in fear, to two other men as he collapsed onto the sand in front of them. They both knelt down to check on him as he pushed their hands away. "OTHERS!" He shouted again as he motioned over to the trees where all three of them stood and watched the scene unfold before them.
The tall blonde man in the group stood back up and cradled his arm slightly before he marched towards them, rage clear on his face. The closer he got to them, his expression hardened and Sam knelt in anticipation as the man reached them just in time for Eko to swing his cane. It connected with the man's head hard enough to produce a sickening thud as the blonde man fell onto the sand like a rag doll.
Sam hung back and watched as Eko and Ana Lucia walked soundlessly past the unconscious man and both proceeded to engage the remaining two men until they were subdued as well. "You still wanna tell me that nothing's going on?" Ana Lucia snapped as she gently prodded the Asian man with her boot.
Sam knelt down and rolled the blonde man onto his back so that he wouldn't inhale any sand before he woke up. His eyes immediately darted to the darkened stain on the shoulder of his shirt and he moved the fabric aside. He winced in recognition of the wound that could only come from a lifetime of hunting and handling firearms. "I don't know what their intentions are, but this one's been shot," Sam pointed out as he stood back up and pointed down at the hole in the man's shoulder. "It looks like he might have dug the bullet out already, too."
Ana Lucia joined him and studied the wound in trepidation as she shook her head at their situation. "Let's get them into the pit. We can't find out anything until they wake up first."
"Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful that we were able to squeeze in a few hours of peace and quiet," Dean commented out of the blue as he kept his attention focused on the darkened forest in front of him. He looked over as Sayid shot him a questioning look and let out a deep sigh. "However, all of a sudden, I'ma thinkin' that nobody's coming for us."
Sayid gently nodded his head over at Dean before they both turned back to the forest and each cast their own inquisitive gaze on the area. They had kept a vigilant watch on their group ever since they had returned from their hike with Charlie and Aaron. He couldn't help it, just because Dean could feel in his gut that all of their earlier warning bells were no longer going off, it didn't mean that he was ready to completely lower his guard. Apparently, Sayid felt the same way.
"Considering what we were told by Rousseau, this does all seem like it was just an elaborate rouse," Sayid agreed.
"Yeah, a rouse designed by her," Dean snorted in disbelief. "Still, we all fell for it." Dean reached behind his back, inadvertently, and allowed his fingertips to graze against the reassuring metal of the gun tucked into his jeans before he crossed his arms in agitation.
"Do you really think that it's plausible for these Others to be after Walt?" Sayid asked after a pregnant silence.
"I'll be honest, I don't know what to think," Dean shook his head. "Who knows if there are even Others out there. For all we know, Rousseau could have been just playing us based on paranoia."
"Yes, but to what end?" Sayid asked him in exasperation. Dean glanced over at him and immediately recognized a small amount of trust on his face and wanted nothing more than to roll his eyes at his naivety. "Dean, there is no way that she could have known about Ethan," Sayid argued further. "In fact, we wouldn't have even taken her threats into consideration if we hadn't already had a foreign person infiltrate our camp."
"Yeah, well...we're divided once again," Dean informed him. Sayid let out a choked noise of agreement as they once again allowed the silence to settle around them for a short moment. "You know, we've been back here for a while, shouldn't we have heard something by now? Anything?"
"Perhaps they have yet to return from this Black Rock," Sayid mused.
"Yeah, well, just between you and me...I'm about three seconds away from marching my ass over to the hatch to find out what's going on," Dean told him. "I never was that good with the whole staying patient shtick anyways." Sayid chuckled deeply in bemusement as Dean uncrossed his arms and finally allowed himself to relax marginally.
"Okay, no one is out there. No one is coming."
Dean and Sayid both turned together and gazed across the cave in beguiled interest at Charlie. He animatedly spoke to two other people from their survival group, a woman with a concerned look on her face and a man that seemed to hang onto every word that Charlie told them. For the life of him, Dean couldn't recall either of their names.
"But the…but the French woman said..." the woman meekly spoke up.
"The French woman is missing a bloody wing nut. I mean, it was all bollocks," Charlie explained to them fervently. "It's a ghost story. She set the fire herself."
Sayid inhaled deeply through his nose and shook his head in disbelief as Charlie watched both of the people in front of him take in the information he had just given them. He turned suddenly towards Sayid and Dean almost as if he felt their penetrating gaze on him and shrunk under their scrutiny. "What?"
Sayid's eyes dropped to the ground for a brief moment before he glanced back up and shook his head. "Nothing." He bestowed an exhausted smile on Dean before he turned and walked off towards one of the campfires that had been set up throughout the cave.
"No, it's not nothing," Dean corrected Sayid. He pointed over at Charlie and nodded his head away from the segregated groups of people in the cave. He waited until Charlie nodded in understanding before he walked over to where he had motioned, aware the entire time that Charlie had followed behind him sedately.
He turned back around and fixed him with a look of reprimand as Charlie's eyes widened slightly. "Sayid and I both instructed you not to let your prejudice with the situation run away from you. Did you even hear a word of what we said?"
"My prejudice with the situation?" Charlie asked incredulously as he studiously ignored Dean's question. "You mean the situation where some crazy ass woman kidnapped Claire's son?"
Dean rolled his eyes and opened his mouth to respond as Shannon shuttled past them into the caves, panic dripping from her frame. "Hey, has anyone seen Vincent?" She waited a moment as she was met with confused looks before she rolled her eyes. "The dog? Anyone seen him?" Both people around her shook their heads as she moved on to another couple close by to Charlie and Dean. "Has anyone seen the dog?"
"Wait, you already lost Vincent?" Dean asked in disbelief. Shannon spun around and shot him a murderous look as he held up his hands in surrender. "I totally didn't mean that the way it came out?"
"Oh, you mean the fact that the spoiled rich girl couldn't even do the one thing that a little kid asked of her?" Shannon spat at him. "That way?"
"Shannon..." Dean began.
"If you tell me to calm down, so help me god..." Shannon began as she marched towards the fire and picked up a spare torch. She shot him a scathing look before she stomped off back towards the cave entrance.
"Wait, Shannon, where are you going?"
She didn't even acknowledge the question as Sayid stood up from his seat next to the fire and shot Dean a quizzical look before he followed after her.
"This is what I'm talking about, Charlie," Dean told the man next to him. "We're already at Defcon Five with the tension around here. Please, don't make it worse."
"I'm not trying to make it worse," Charlie argued with him. "I'm trying to defuse the tension that was created when that loon told us that we would die if we didn't run or hide. Look around, Dean. Everybody in here is on edge because of that."
Dean glanced around at the people in the cave and couldn't help but concede to Charlie's point as he noticed that there was nobody asleep despite the late hour. Moreover, every eye that he caught was wide and held a hint of terror. "Ok, I'll give you that, Charlie, but you really do need to tone it down with the…"
"You're just like Jack, you know that?" Charlie spat with disgust.
Dean was so surprised at Charlie's statement and grimace that the words on his tongue momentarily got lost before he shook his head to collect himself. "Excuse me?" he argued.
"You and Jack are just alike," Charlie repeated. "You both have these secrets that concern each and every one of us, but you hold onto them until you think our delicate souls will be able to handle them."
Dean made a fist so tight that he thought he felt something in his hand pop as he shuffled forward to close the gap between himself and Charlie. He could feel the frustration that he had worked to bury for the last month and half come to head inside of him as Charlie's smug smile slowly began to vanish with each step that Dean took.
"I said to let go of me!" Shannon screamed as she marched past Dean so quickly that he had to catch himself so that he didn't fall to the ground. "HEY!" Sayid shot Dean an apologetic look as he followed after Shannon and tried to grab her arm to stop her, which she shrugged off.
"Sun, have you seen Jin?" Shannon rambled as she stopped in front of her. "Is he here?"
Dean shared a confused look with Charlie before he followed after Sayid and Shannon. Sun stood up from her crouched position and dusted off her hands on her pants. She tilted her head in contemplation as she searched the faces of Sayid and Dean to determine if Shannon was being serious. "He is on the raft, with Michael, Sawyer and…"
"Walt is on the island!" Shannon yelled as Sayid once again tried to pull Shannon away from the area to calm her down as she only pushed him away from her.
"It couldn't have been Walt. He is on the raft," Sun tried to rationalize with her.
"I know what I saw!" Shannon argued. "It was him! It was Walt!"
"Shannon, please lower your voice," Sayid instructed her. "You'll upset the rest of the group."
Dean pushed through the few people still in front of him and stopped right next to Sayid in an effort to help him out when Shannon shook her head and spoke again. "I heard whispers."
Dean stiffened at her admission and shot an accusing look at Sayid as the crowd around them grew quiet at her admission. "Where?" Claire inquired.
"Everywhere," Shannon told her.
Dean could clearly remember his ordeal in the jungle after he had been injured by that damn arrow in his shoulder. When he took into account the way he had been raised, he didn't like to rely on anything unexplainable to describe any situation. Therefore, at the time, he had chalked up the whispers he had heard as delusions caused by blood loss. Eventually, though, Sayid had confirmed that he had also experienced the sound of whispers all around him that began and ended out of thin air.
"Did you tell her about when you were in the jungle?" Dean hissed to Sayid.
"No, the only other person I shared that information with, besides you, was Sawyer," Sayid explained to him.
"I don't understand. What whispers? Who?" Charlie asked.
"I don't know," Shannon told them with a defeated shrug. "Them."
"Do you think something happened to the raft?" Sun asked, as she choked down a sob.
"Dude, you better do something before the apprehension in this cave turns into full blown panic," Dean whispered as Sayid nodded and marched up next to Shannon. "Nothing has happened to the raft. Walt is with your husband, with Sawyer..."
"Sayid, I know what I saw," Shannon hissed.
Dean backed away from the group and collided with something solid before he turned around and met the tired smile of Hurley with Jack in tow. "Oh thank god," he muttered as he clapped Hurley on the shoulder before he stepped forward towards Jack. "It's good to know that you guys remember where the caves are," he remarked. Jack shot Dean a withering look as Hurley let out a scoffing laugh.
"Dude, trust me when I say that he's not in the mood," Hurley told him with a smile as he patted his shoulder and walked away from them.
"They're back!" Charlie exclaimed to the group in the caves as Hurley walked over to them.
"What's the problem, Dean?" Jack asked impatiently as he walked away from Dean.
"Oh, not much, actually…besides the fact that Shannon thinks that she just saw Walt in the jungle, which is the least amount of shit that's gone down over here," Dean snarked. "If you're interested in knowing, Charlie, Sayid and I just got back from a little hike of our very own a few hours ago."
Jack stopped his movement and turned very slowly to face Dean, his face a mask of barely restrained disbelief. "What hike?"
"Oh, we all had to go out into the forest and get Claire's son back from the same crazy ass French chick that had you guys searching for dynamite," Dean informed him.
Jack stared Dean down for any flinch of insincerity before he shut his eyes tightly in disbelief. "Are you actually telling me that Rousseau took Claire's baby?" he asked.
"Aaron." Jack opened his eyes and narrowed them in confusion as Dean shot him a knowing smile. "Claire's son's name is Aaron. I guess the trauma of being, first, knocked unconscious and then, second, having her child kidnapped forced the issue."
Jack let out a frustrated sound as he shook his head incredulously. "Oh, by the way…" Dean began. "Rousseau also copped to starting the fire that caused that big column of dangerous smoke we were all running from. Maybe someone should thank their lucky stars that she didn't also decide to lead all of you off of the closest cliff."
"It probably would have saved me from having to deal with everything else going on," Jack muttered as he spun around and marched away from Dean.
Dean had to admit that he had never seen Jack look as stressed out as he had just a few moments ago. "Hey, what's going on with him?" Dean asked Hurley as he passed back by him.
Hurley opened his mouth and shut it wryly before he shrugged casually. "Dude's just got a lot on his plate.
"Yeah, well, that's sort of the M.O. of everybody from our plane crash," Dean casually remarked as Jack hopped up on a landing in front of the entire group. He waited as the caves grew quiet while everyone gathered in front of him, hopeful for any sign of good news.
"Some of you may be unaware that Locke found…uh…a hatch in the ground about a half a mile from here." The group lit up in silent discussions as Dean crossed his arms and waited to see where Jack was going with this speech. "We left to blow it open so that we could hide inside…so all of us could hide inside, in case..."
Dean shot Hurley a curious glance at the defeated nature of their leader as Jack let out a deep sigh. "But…that doesn't matter now because it's not going to work. There's no way for all of us to get down in there tonight."
"Jack" Charlie interrupted him. "Where's Dr. Arzt?"
Jack's face slacked at the question as he shook his head morosely. "Um, he didn't make it."
"Dude, understatement," Hurley muttered as the entire group began to talk at once. Dean turned and looked up at him and couldn't help but notice the blood drain from his face. "Uh, Artz kinda got blown up."
Dean's jaw dropped as he glanced back up at Jack in disbelief at his cavalier attitude. One of their people had been blown up? What the hell kind of hike had they gone on? "Did you see them? Did you see the Others?" Shannon spoke up.
"Hey, Shannon, there are no Others," Charlie snapped at her. "We've already had this conversation."
"What the hell would you know about it?" Shannon snapped back. "You finally get invited on a hike and you didn't even see anything!"
"You have no clue what you're saying. There's no one out there!" Charlie yelled.
"You don't know that!"
"…and you're just making up rubbish!"
"Dude," Hurley muttered.
"Yeah, this is what I've been lucky enough to deal with," Dean informed him.
"Hey! Everything's going to be okay. Let's just take it easy," Jack interrupted them. He waited several moments for the entire group to wind down and refocus their attention on him. "Look, we're all going to be alright. We're going to stay here tonight, okay? Together."
"Then what the hell was the point of that entire trip?" Dean shouted. "What the hell was the point of one of our own being killed if we're just gonna do what Sayid and I said we should do the entire time?"
"I've already told you that we don't have enough time to get everybody into the hatch," Jack shouted back. "But, that doesn't matter anymore, we've still got four guns, right?" He waited until Dean nodded over at him reluctantly before he continued. "We'll put lookouts at all the entrances. We're all going to be safe as long as we stay together. The sun comes up in three hours and we're all going to be here to see that happen. I promise."
If Dean hadn't been present at Jack's speech, he probably wouldn't have believed that it had actually happened. Jack had just repeated back to their group a plan that Sayid and he had recommended, but had only been met with amusement. They had been treated like children. "Ok, now what the hell is he doing here?" Hurley hissed as Locke casually strolled past them with a bundle of cable under his right arm.
"Well well…it seems like you've finally come to the realization that Palpatine is, indeed, the bad guy," Dean commented as Locke stopped in front of Jack and spoke to him in hushed tones.
"Ha, nice!" Hurley laughed before he shook his head ruefully. "Star Wars aside, that guy is such an ass. You know?"
"Yeah, I know," Dean reassured him. "Do you?"
"Do you really think this is the smartest thing to do right now, John?" Jack asked, loud enough for everybody in the cave to hear.
"Between you and me," Hurley whispered as he watched the smug smile sneak up on Locke's face. "I think Locke is a bit too obsessed with the hatch. He blew it open even when I yelled for him not to."
"You're right, Jack," Locke answered Jack in the same volume. "The safest thing is to stay here and wait for morning…wait for these Others, to see if they ever show up…wait for the brave folks on the raft to bring help." Dean tilted his head as Locke lazily shrugged at his one observation. "Me? I'm tired of waiting."
Dean sneered as Locke walked right by him and Hurley and he returned the look of hostility with that of a pleasant smile that stretched from ear to ear. Dean just knew that if he were a few years younger and Locke was a few IQ points lower, that smug old man would have probably patted his head, depreciatively, as he'd passed. "Yeah, and he woulda lost an arm for doing it, too."
"What was that?" Hurley asked.
Dean tore his eyes away from Locke as he left the caves and chuckled as he realized that he'd voiced his threat out loud. "Nothing, man…just thinking out loud," Dean told him as he shook his head. He turned his attention back to Jack just as he jumped down from his stoop and walked over to Sayid to speak with him.
"Hey, I've been wondering something," Dean admitted to Hurley. "If you guys actually managed to get the hatch opened, why doesn't Jack want everyone in there? Is it just a hole and that's all?"
Hurley paled at the question as he shook his head in denial. "I don't know what Jack's full reasons are. For all we know, it could just be what he said and there isn't enough time to get everyone down there." Hurley's gaze shot to ground where he lightly kicked around a few rocks at his feet before he glanced up at Dean, a strange seriousness on his features that Dean had yet to be privy to. "Just between you and me, there could be an underground Twinkie factory inside of that hatch and I still wouldn't go down there," he explained. "It's cursed."
Dean's interest piqued at Hurley's explanation. He had heard of curses before, in fact, there was a whole entry about them in his father's journal that detailed John Winchester's own experiences with them. However, those were usually only just objects. He'd never heard of an entire place being cursed. Haunted, yes…but never cursed.
"Dean, you got a moment?" Jack asked as his voice interrupted Dean's musings. Dean glanced over at him dazedly and nodded over at him as Jack motioned to a secluded section of the cave for him to follow. "I'll be right back, dude. Maybe you can tell me about that curse when I'm done with Jack."
Hurley nodded down at him sheepishly as Dean followed Jack to where he had indicated and stopped behind him. Jack turned around slowly and studied the rest of the people in the cave to ensure that nobody had followed behind them or had any desire to eavesdrop before he looked at Dean square in the eyes.
"I was wondering if you'd be interested in heading back up to the hatch with me," Jack offered. "In about ten minutes."
Dean waited for Jack to divulge more details before he narrowed his eyes in confusion. "Wait, you want me to go back to the hatch with you?" Jack nodded as Dean tilted his head. "Is there any particular reason why you want me?"
Jack let out an exhausted chuckled as he furrowed his brow at the question and shrugged. "Mostly, the fact that it's late and dark. I spoke with Sayid and he agreed to stay here and keep watch, but I'd prefer to have someone that knows how to handle a gun at my back."
"Ah, so it's about protection, then," Dean surmised. "Well, while I make sure you get back to the hatch unscathed, who's supposed to protect me?"
"I will," Jack told him simply.
"Yeah…question, how often in your prestigious surgical life have you ever run into the need to handle a firearm?" Dean asked him with barely contained amusement.
"Not often," Jack admitted with a wry smile. "Still, I'm pretty sure I get the basics of point and pull the trigger."
"Yeah, you say that now, but just wait until adrenaline makes that point unsteady or jumpy," Dean told him with a wry smile before he nodded his head at Jack. What good was being stuck on this island if he couldn't poke a little fun at people?
"I just heard that you're going back to the hatch," Hurley announced as he stopped in front of Dean and Jack. Both men glanced behind Hurley at Sayid who held up his hands in surrender as a bemused smile crossed his face. "You guys are kidding, right?"
"About heading back? Nope, I'm completely serious," Jack told him as he grabbed his gun from the back of his pants and inserted the clip Dean had handed him.
"What about all that stuff you said about waiting 'til morning and watching the sun rise?" Hurley asked incredulously. Dean glanced down at his own handgun and popped his clip into place before he turned to Hurley and gave him a reassuring smile.
"Hurley, we've got people at the hatch that need their backs watched as well," he told him. "Mind you, Locke I'm not so concerned about, but Kate's there with him by herself."
"Can't Kate handle herself?" Hurley suggested warily.
"Generally, I'd say she could, but I'd rather not take any chances," Dean told Hurley as he tucked his gun back into the waistband of his jeans with a smile. "I'm pretty sure Jack feels the same way."
Jack nodded up at Hurley as he stood up and mirrored Dean's actions with his own gun. "I do."
"…and, besides, he's not going alone." Dean told him as he patted him on the shoulder and motioned for Jack to lead the way.
"Ok, where are they?" Dean asked as they entered the clearing where the hatch was located. The natural sounds of the environment around them was the only thing both of them could hear aside from a slight whistle as the wind hit the open door of the hatch.
"I'm not sure, maybe they already went down there," Jack told him as they both jumped on top of the metal. Dean positioned his torch over the darkened hole and glanced down in vain. It was just too dark and too deep for them to see anything past a few feet.
"I think this is the cable that Locke brought with him from the caves," Dean observed as he pointed to its path down the hole.
"Kate!" Jack shouted down into the darkness. "Locke!"
They both waited several moments for either of them to answer before Dean stood back up and set down his torch. "What are you doing?" Jack asked.
"One of them should have answered you by now," Dean commented as he grabbed the cable and gave it a generous tug. "What do you think? First or follow after me?"
"First," Jack told him as he grabbed the offered cable and began his descent into the darkness. Dean waited until Jack had climbed down a few feet ahead of him before he crouched over the blown open hole and followed leisurely after him. He wasn't even aware of how long this climb would be.
"Did you guys blow open the hatch with enough time during the daylight to get a good idea of how deep this shaft is?" he asked around a grunt.
"No," Jack grunted up at him. "We didn't even get back with the dynamite until the sun had gone down." Dean bit back a curse as his imagination ran wild and he realized they could be climbing into the great abyss for all they knew. "Locke dropped a rock down and based on the sound of the impact, he and Kate estimated it was about forty to fifty feet deep."
Forty to fifty feet…that was far. "That's just freaking great," Dean muttered as they both continued their descent down into the darkness. Dean kept his gaze focused on the opening above him and continued to gauge how far he had gone based on how far away the light from the moon got.
After several more moments of silence, Dean stilled as he heard the sound of water as it splashed around below him. "I'm down," Jack shouted up at him in glee as Dean scuttled down a few more feet and landed in ankle deep water.
"You guys must have destroyed a pipe or something when you blew open the hatch door," Dean guessed. He studied their surroundings as best as he could in the dark before his eyes adjusted enough to identify a sliver of light down a narrow hallway to their left. He patted Jack on the shoulder and pulled out his gun as he led the way towards it.
"This all looks like it was man-made," Dean confessed as his fingertips grazed against the cement walls that surrounded them as they walked past.
"Well, the hatch itself had to have been man-made," Jack told him. "The only things we didn't know was who had built it and what was inside."
Dean reached the sliver of light and marveled at the fact that it had come from an ajar door. A very thick ajar door. "Here, help me get this open," Dean requested. Jack nodded and tucked his gun back into his pants as he joined Dean on his right side. Dean counted down from three, quietly, before they both pushed with all of their weight against the solid mass as it began to move with noisy creaks.
"Holy shit, it's got to be made of steel," Dean hissed as he pushed away from the door, breathless, and studied the wider space they had opened. "What do you think? Can you fit through there?"
Jack gauged the space carefully. He nodded over at Dean before he crouched down next to it, sucked in completely and then squeezed through with very little hesitation. Dean chuckled at Jack's triumphant face from the other side and moved to follow Jack's example, exactly. He was relieved when he made it through easier than Jack had and let out a deep breath as he smiled up at him. "Well, that was fairly painless."
Jack chuckled at Dean's cavalier attitude as they both turned to assess the new room the door had led them to. "Wow…" Dean muttered as awe etched across both of their faces.
"What is all of this?" Jack asked as his eyes took in the large machines that surrounded the perimeter of the round room they were in. "What's it all for?" Dean could only gawk in stupefied shock as they both walked towards the desk in the middle of the room. They both came to a stop and stared down at the green screened Apple computer that sat peacefully in front of them.
"This looks like the kind of computer that teachers used to make us play Oregon Trail on," Dean observed. He glanced back up around the room as his eye caught the large white squared numbers that hung above a door in direct eye-line with the computer in front of them. He tilted his head as the last number flipped so that it had counted backwards. "What do you think that's for?"
Jack followed Dean's outstretched finger to the number on the wall and scratched his head at the whole situation. "It looks like some sort of counter," he guessed.
"Yeah, but for what?" Dean asked.
"Maybe this computer has something to do with it," Jack suggested as he reached forward and rested his fingertips over the 'execute' button.
Jack jumped as loud music poured through the room from unseen speakers and he quickly pulled his hand away from the computer so he could point his gun out in front of him. Dean spun around at the blaring music and backed away from the computer until his back collided with one of the concrete walls. He held his gun up next to his head and did his best to ignore Jack as he studied the round room for any intruders.
Nuh-uh, I refuse to go down if Mama Cass is the last music I have to hear on this Earth, Dean thought as Locke appeared in the doorway to his right. "I wouldn't do that, Jack," Locke suggested calmly. Dean pressed himself further against the wall and safely in the shadows as Jack spun around and pointed his gun directly at Locke as he stood ramrod straight in front of them.
"Where's Kate?" Jack asked.
Dean's mouth snapped shut as he spotted the gun pointed at the side of Locke's head and bit back a curse. He caught Jack's gaze and shook his head at him as he remained very still in the shadowed area.
"Move and I kill him," an accented voice spoke from the shadows. "I suggest you put the gun down, now."
Jack wavered momentarily before he caught Dean's eye. Dean shook his head and pointed at his own gun as Jack immediately retrained his gun out in front of him. "Where's Kate?" Dean sucked in a deep breath and slowly started to move against the cement wall towards Locke and his captor.
"Jack, it's okay," Locke tried to reassure him.
"I said to drop it!" The voice next to Locke shouted again as he pushed his gun closer to Locke's head. Dean stopped his movement towards them and winced at the quick look of terror that crossed Locke's face. It disappeared just as quickly as it had appeared and Dean took that as his cue to quietly begin to move again. Just a few more steps and he'd be able to sneak up behind the person that had captured Locke and possibly Kate.
"Where's Kate?!" Jack yelled back. Dean tried not roll his eyes at the anguish in Jack's voice. He was pretty damn sure that if Jack didn't find out where Kate was soon, he'd get trigger happy instead just on principal.
"Kate's fine," Locke assured Jack. "Just put down the…"
"I'm not putting down anything," Jack spat.
Dean and Jack both jumped slightly as the man behind Locke fired his gun into the air. "Do you want him to die? Put it down."
Jack glanced over at Dean's trajectory and bit back a smile as he walked in an arc away from the shadows so that he was completely behind Locke. "Is this what you were talking about, Locke?" he asked sarcastically as he attempted to keep the attention on him. "Is this your destiny? All roads lead here?"
"Jack, calm down," Locke commanded.
Dean blew out a relieved breath as the man from the shadows relocated himself so that he was directly behind Locke and kept the barrel of his gun pressed into Locke's head. "Lower your gun or I'll blow his damned head off, brother!"
Dean raised his gun and couldn't help the smirk that graced his face. "You might wanna rethink that, asshole," Dean spat as he pressed his own gun into the man's curly brown hair. His smirk grew in satisfaction as the man in front of him tensed up slightly, but continued to face away from him. He could almost see the cogs turning in his head as Locke crouched down away from him before he turned around and absconded the gun that had been pressed into his head moments before.
"It's you," Jack murmured, a look of amazement on his face as he stared down the man in front of Dean as he put his hands up in surrender.
"Do you know this asshole, Jack?" Dean asked.
"Which one of you is him?" the man in front of Dean asked out of the blue. Dean shot a confused look to Jack and then Locke as Locke let out a deep sigh. "He thinks we're someone important."
"One of you has to be him!" the man shouted.
"He specifically asked me what did one snowman say to the other?" Locke chimed in as Dean shot him another crazy look.
Dean barely lowered the gun as he stared, incredulously, at the guy in front of him before he turned his attention back to Locke. "He asked you a riddle? Did you tell him that it smells like carrots in here?"
The man spun around so fast that Dean almost pulled the trigger. "You are him."
"If by him, you mean the guy pointing a gun at you, then yeah, I'm him," Dean told him with a smirk.
"They said that I'd know him when he answered the riddle," the man frantically told Dean as he stared at him with admiration.
"Oh they did, huh?" Dean told him with a wry smile. "Did they also inform you that every kindergartner in the country knows that riddle? My brother told me that one when I was thirteen…he was very proud of himself."
The man's smile remained on his face as Jack strode forward and looked him square in the eye. "Where's Kate?" Kate watched with rapt interest as she lowered herself down from a vent behind Dean and quietly selected a gun from the gun cabinet in the hatch before she loudly cocked it.
Dean and Locke both spun around and pointed their gun at Kate as she panicked and pulled the trigger on hers. They both ducked with Jack and Locke as the bullet connected with the aged computer behind them and destroyed it.
The admiration on the man's face melted away to reveal horror as he stepped away from Dean. "Oh my god, I have to…" he began.
"Nuh-uh, stop right there," Dean demanded as he held his gun, unwaveringly, pointed at the man.
"Dean, don't…" Locke began.
"Don't what?" Dean asked incredulously. "He had a gun pointed at your head, Locke. I'm also pretty sure that he had Kate locked up somewhere."
"He did, because of Locke," Kate yelled venomously.
Jack stared at Locke in rage as Dean let out an angry chuckle and shook his head in disbelief. "It seems to me that the only other place I'd wanna point this gun is at you, so you tell me what the best option is from your perspective," Dean fired back at him.
"You don't understand, I have to fix that computer," the man spoke up with a scared lilt in his voice. "If I don't, we're all gonna die."
"No," Sam told Ana Lucia as he shook his head at her idea. She only smiled back at him in satisfaction as he crossed his arms over his chest. "This isn't gonna work."
"It'll work alright," she assured him as she jumped back and forth from foot to foot in preparation for the needed blows. "Admit it, this is the perfect way to find out who they are and where they came from. Make them trust us."
"Yeah, it's a great plan," Sam admitted. "The only flaw is that they probably saw you on the beach when you helped Eko take them out." Ana Lucia's haughty smile waned slightly as she rolled her eyes at Sam's reasoning. "The worst thing that we could do is underestimate these people. If those men are who you think they are, then they're smart enough to remember one of the people that attacked them."
She stopped her movements as Sam's argument washed over her completely. Her nose scrunched up to match her furrowed brow as she turned away from him and replayed the events on the beach as best as she could in her mind's eye. Eko had taken out the taller, blonde man first. He had been no trouble, but when he went after the other two men, they had fought back and she had stepped in to assist him. Either one of them could have seen her at any point.
Sam? He had allowed them to take care of everything, but she knew that he had hung back at a respectful distance in case they would need him. They hadn't. He couldn't have been seen at any point. "Are you suggesting that you take my place?"
"Of course I am," Sam told her. He tried to not let himself be too annoyed when she snorted at him in amusement as he let out a frustrated huff and rubbed his eyes as a dull pain shot across his temples. "Is it really that implausible that I go down there instead of you?"
"A little," Ana Lucia shrugged sheepishly.
"Yeah, well…I'd like to think that you, of all people, are more than aware that I can defend myself and others around me if I need to," Sam seethed at her. The smile on her face faded away as her mind immediately conjured up images of Goodwin. Him as he stood over her with a knife and a confident smile before Sam had showed up and shoved a spear through his stomach. If he hadn't showed up, Goodwin would have killed her and probably reported it back to the others as an accident.
She contemplated his suggestion for a few moments and slowly nodded her consent before she motioned for Eko to join them. "You have to promise that you'll stay near the opening so we can pull you out if we have to."
Sam nodded in agreement as Eko stepped forward and gave Sam a grim look. Sam loosened out his muscles and popped his neck back and forth before he breathed deeply in and out several times. He squeezed his eyes shut, scared that he would try to defend himself is he knew the hit was coming, and almost said a silent prayer before he nodded his head tersely.
He only felt two of the blows before he collapsed onto the sand.
"Hurry up and get him into the pit," Ana Lucia loudly ordered as Eko picked up Sam's limp body and placed him over his shoulder as he walked towards the tiger pit.
"Hey, let us out of here right now!" He heard a southern voice shout from deep inside. Eko nodded over at Bernard to lift the bamboo cover and placed Sam into the pit as carefully as could while he still maintained the cover of nonchalance. He tried not to wince as Sam landed at the bottom with a tumble before he nodded for Bernard to replace the cover.
"Hey, wait. Come back!" Michael spoke up as he stepped over the new body in their prison and jumped to try to reach the bamboo. "You can't just leave us in here!"
"It's no use, Michael. They ain't coming back," Sawyer huffed as he shifted his shoulder the wrong way and cursed.
Michael stepped away from the opening and nearly tripped on the heap at his feet before he righted himself on a root hanging out of one of the dirt walls. "Who'd they throw down here?" he asked as he kept his gaze locked on the sunlight that streamed through the open branches above them.
"It's just some guy," Sawyer observed as he knelt down next to the unconscious body. He placed his fingers on the man's neck and felt a steady pulse beneath his skin right as he let out a deep and painful moan.
Sawyer stayed crouched next to him as Sam slowly opened his eyes and allowed them to adjust to the sunlight before he took inventory of the three men in the pit with him as they stared down at him.
Ok, Sammy, time to give the performance of your life, his brother's voice instructed him. Sam's eyes grew wide with fear as he quickly shuffled away from the three men until his back connected with the dirt at the edge of the pit. "Hey, it's ok. Calm down," Michael soothingly spoke up as he held his hands out in front of him as if Sam were a wild dog.
Sam's eyes remained filled with fear as Sawyer stood back up from his crouched position and mirrored Michael's submissive stance. "Are you alright, man?" Sam could see genuine concern in their eyes as he convinced himself to tone down his performance in order to gain their trust.
"Who the hell are you?" he queried around a painful grimace. It was good to know that he didn't have to pretend to be in mesmerizing pain, but he couldn't help but wonder what kind of a whopping Eko could give to someone that he considered an enemy. Maybe he just didn't want to know.
"We, uh…crashed on this island," Michael told him as Sam slowly stood up and worked past a dizzy spell. "We were on a plane from Sydney to Los Angeles."
"What?" Sam asked in confusion as he lowered his hand from his head.
"Forty or so of us made it out alive," Sawyer informed him.
"Was it Oceanic? Flight 815?" Sam asked, his earlier pain forgotten as hope began to swell within him.
"You were on it, too?" Sawyer asked as he narrowed his eyes at him in caution. He kept his gaze planted on his features, almost as if he were studying him.
"Were you in the back? It broke off mid-air." Michael told him. "How did you…"
"I don't know," Sam admitted as he dropped the pretense and realized that these men might have been in the same section as his brother. They might be able to lead their group to the rest of the survivors. "I got up to go to the bathroom and it all happened so fast. I must have passed out because I woke up underwater and made my way to the surface…swam to shore."
"You've been out here by yourself all this time?" Sawyer asked in disbelief as he readjusted the grip he had on his shoulder with a painful grimace.
Sam opened his mouth to inform them that there had been a mistake and that the other people with him were also survivors when his gaze was instantly drawn to the bullet wound on Sawyer's shoulder that he had seen earlier. How had that even happened?
"When you take into consideration that he could have been planted on the beach in order to take someone else from our group," Sam heard Ana Lucia's voice ring out clearly in his head as a means to deter him.
"Yeah, and we all thought that Goodwin was just another regular passenger on our doomed plane," Sam's own voice had argued earlier that morning to the rest of their group. What was the matter with him? Just because these men knew the details of their plane crash didn't mean they could be trusted. One of them had been shot for Christ's sake!
"Yeah, I've just been trying to find food and find my way back to anybody else that might have survived," Sam told them as he tore his eyes away from Sawyer's injury. "What happened to you?"
Sawyer glanced down at the blood stained section of his shirt and crinkled his nose at the wound. "I got shot," he admitted casually, as if it were a regular occurrence.
"We set out on a raft that we built to find rescue and bring it back to the island, but these men found us first and took my boy," Michael embellished before his voice broke on a sob. "They shot Sawyer when he put up a fight."
"Do you want me to take a look at it?" Sam asked, his act momentarily forgotten as he noticed the amount of pain that the man before him was trying to keep under wraps. "It's just that I have a pretty good track record with gunshot wounds, thanks dad."
Sawyer stiffened at his statement before a shadow stretched across the opening of their prison and then disappeared. "I say we get ready to spring this joint."
"How do you intend to do that?" Sam asked as he glanced up at the thick bamboo above them. He turned back to Sawyer and let out a shocked gasp as Sawyer pulled a gun out of his jeans and held it up discreetly.
"I figure that the next time Shaft opens up this cage, he's gonna get a surprising little howdy-doody."
Sam's eyes widened further before he shook his head in defeat. "She was right."
"What was that, partner?" Sawyer asked as he lowered his gun when the shadow fell across them again. Sam took advantage of that moment as he stepped forward , elbowed Sawyer in his wounded shoulder and then grabbed the gun that he had dropped and pointed it out at the three men in front of him. "Get me outta here!"
"What the hell is your problem?" Sawyer barked as he stood back up from where he had fallen to clutch his shoulder.
A woman appeared above them and opened up the cage so she could lower a thick rope down near the opening. Sam kept his back to her as he continued to aim the gun at the three men. "Sam, grab the rope," Ana Lucia shouted down at him.
Sawyer's eyes widened as he realized exactly why this man had seemed so familiar to him. He may not have acted exactly the same as Dean or even looked exactly the same, but there were underlying factors that he could pick out that definitely linked them together as kin. "Sam? Sam Winchester?"
Sam grazed the rope before his eyes widened at the use of his last name and he raised the gun fully back up to point at Sawyer. "How in the hell do you know my last name?"
Sawyer grinned in relief as he kept a vigilant watch on the gun that Sam had pointed at his head before he stepped towards him. "Your brother's Dean Winchester," he told him simply. "He's with our group of people."
Author's Note: TAH-DAH! I realize that I'm very very very extremely late with posting this new story, but wow…these last few months have been hectic. Between Thanksgiving and then Christmas, I usually have a month of relaxation at work where I rarely have anything urgent come up. Not the case this year…I have been go, go, go for WEEKS. But, we're on the cusp of a new year…and it couldn't come sooner! I'd like to give mucho mucho thanks to TrappedInWonderland, The Sun Will Shine Clear, redladybug12, RedEYES-Fallen, Arlena4815162342, Deanwinchesterrocks, The Archivist613, JJxWillxProtectXYou, elmoisemo6, DavidB226Morris, Guest, evil-step-sister, LilacFree, Guest and Calen for taking the time to review the last two chapters of Winchester Mystery Crash. I hope everybody enjoys this first chapter and keeps this story on alert to find out what happens! You all ROCK THE CASBAH!