The morning after the survivors of Oceanic flight 815 burn the fuselage, they come.
Shannon doesn't know who they are, these rescuers, but is too grateful for a cold glass of water; a hairbrush; no more sand sticking to the bottoms of her feet; a bed, to notice much of anything. She lets pseudo leader Jack overtake the whole operation, a nervous Kate hovering at his side.
The rest of them wait and then greedily take advantage of the amenities as soon as possible, no questions asked.
Shannon lifts her newly painted toenails, resting them on a wicker table as the boat steadily sails away from the island. She watches until the place is just a speck of sand, a simple dot on their horizon.
She swallows and feels uneasy, looking sideways at Boone. He is looking at the fading dot too.
"Something doesn't feel right," he says without looking at her.
///
There are questions and Charlie doesn't like it. Every time they bring him in that room with that solitary light swinging above some cool, metallic table, he feels like he's being persecuted, interrogated like a run of the mill criminal.
The first time, the questions make sense.
What did you see? What did you hear? How many times did you go into that jungle? A Polar Bear? Really?
The second, third, and fourth time? The same questions, the same responses, over and over and over? It's not normal.
A bead of sweat trickles down the nape of his neck as they repeat their same questions over and over on his fifth time, frustration bubbling inside his chest. How many times can they ask him the same questions?
As it is, they've isolated all the survivors from the media. He doesn't even know where they are! Some beach resort where everyone has some accent he can't quite place. They're overly polite those ones, standing around offering everything on God's green earth to his fellow plane mates, everything except a bloody newspaper or television or a mobile phone. The people who do the questioning, however, are definitely American. They aren't as polite, a bit cold and strange he thinks. Like they aren't exactly right in the head.
It's starting to break him, this pressure. The questions. Even his personal headcount of the survivors every morning is driving him a bit mad. Everyone is accounted for though, except Kate. No one knows where she is. Even the little pregnant girl is still around, although he notices them being very careful with that one, as if she might drop dead any second now. Even though they're allowed to lie by the pool and eat as much as they want, it doesn't make up for those moments in that stale, cold room, with that swinging light and silver table, the repeated questions making him feel closer and closer to insanity.
His baggy is almost empty now as the days wear on and none of them are any closer to going home. He shakes more, sweats more; tap tap taps his fingers along that horrible metal table, his foot shaking almost steadily underneath.
Yeah, they'll offer you anything in this place. 'Cept a bloody fix.
///
It's the nicest prison Kate's ever been in. Yeah, there are bars along her windows and she can't exactly come and go as she pleases, but they feed her gourmet meals and don't even use handcuffs when they take her for questioning. The bed is a little lumpy but she gives it four stars, the memory of hard sand and scratchy blue airline blankets all too recent for her mind.
Kate's smart and she realizes what these people want only after her second round of questioning. They've isolated her, she knows the others are all together and free to do almost anything they please. She almost doesn't care, because none of it really matters. She won't give them a hard time. She knows what they want.
They want the survivors of flight 815 to be quiet. They already know about the looped French transmission, all about the polar bears (she figures there's more than one), the weird sound that comes from the jungle and makes the trees quake in it's midst, whatever it was that ripped the pilot from the plane and left him a bloody mangle of limbs; they know it all. Kate Austen uses this to her advantage, just like she's always turned things around her way. It's the way she's survived these past several years.
So she forms a deal. Every one of the survivors, including her, signs some sort of agreement. None of them will talk about what they saw or heard, in exchange of a hefty sum of cash. As for Kate, there's the small paragraph detailing her clearance of all previous charges, a clean slate.
She signs her name with a flourish, proud of saving herself and the rest of her newly formed acquaintances. She's taken care of them all, brandishing the type of power she hasn't felt in years. All from behind bars. It's with this cockiness that she gathers her things, the few items she actually has. It's with this cockiness that she sets a toe past the doorway of the place they've been keeping her.
And the three bullets that strike her hard horizontally down the chest? She takes those with an air of cockiness as well. It's too late for the feeling to fade; it's too late for her to feel anything different. In her last moments, she wonders why these people didn't just leave them on the island to die? Why they didn't just shoot them all like a herd of cattle, right on the spot. Why give them a chance to hope things could be different? Why give Kate Austen the hope that she had saved them all, had finally done something right in her life?
She never gets an answer to these questions. She's dead before she hits the floor, lifeless green eyes upturned to the grey squares of ceiling.
///
Before he can quite figure out what's going on, Sawyer and the rest of the survivors are boarding a plane and landing in a private LA airport. They are sent on their way, each with a large amount of cash weighing heavily in their pockets, their lips sealed about the strange island they were rescued from weeks and weeks ago.
Many of the survivors scatter like rolled dice once given the chance, most heading out in pairs. There are only a handful that linger about the airport, unsure of what to do with their newfound freedom.
He ain't the type to stick around any place if he can help it, but there's an odd feeling in the pit of his stomach. That has been rock star is off like a rocket, ignoring a friendly wave from the blonde pregnant chick and it makes him feel sorry for the girl. Her smile is fading from her pretty face as she scans the airport and he sees her swallow nervously, slowly shouldering her small bag. He realizes she doesn't have anywhere to go, anyone to see, no one to call. Almost makes him sad.
There is a brief moment of hesitation (where he decides to damn the real Sawyer and forget his quest for revenge) and then, without words, he saunters over to her and slides her pack off her back and onto his. They share a cab to the nearest and nicest hotel, neither of them protesting to sharing a room.
She remembers his flash of kindness on the island. He remembers it too. Decides to see what other good things this girl can bring out of him.
And that's just how some things happen.
///
Jack's mother doesn't ask questions when he doesn't return with his father's body. She's so grateful to see him alive, she doesn't ask anything at all. They hold a funeral anyway, burying an empty black casket in a dark hole in the ground instead. Jack swallows, feels uncomfortable in the black suit, choking around his tie. He had felt something on that island, even if it had only been a couple of days. He had felt needed, important; like a leader.
He is no leader, not anymore.
His future is full of countless hours at the hospital, stitching people back together in the best way he knows how. He will forget every person he met on the island. The pregnant girl, the rock star, the southern asshole, the stuck up brother and sister; he will forget them all. One however, that he will never forget. The curly haired, green-eyed beauty that stitched him up, likening the action to curtains. Her fingers had been nimble and quick despite her nervousness. Her voice had been calm and smooth.
Sometimes he dreams of that voice.
He dreams of kissing her and being inside of her, soft thighs wrapped around his thrusting hips. Kate. Kate.
Jack Shepard will not marry. He will not have children. His future holds white hospital floors stained with red blood, snapping rubber gloves and the ecstasy of his own dreams. Real life is mundane. He is nothing here. Nothing without her.
But then, maybe he was never supposed to have her. Maybe she was only ever supposed to be a dream.
///
John Locke signs the contract and takes the allotted amount of cash offered. He wheels off, unable to feel a thing below his waist.
A month later, he opens his mouth to whoever will listen. He doesn't care what he signed, doesn't care about consequences, doesn't care about a thing. He's tired of wheeling around with the memory of walking and feeling so fresh in his mind.
The media goes crazy. Locke can't leave his house without at least five reporters following him, shouting questions at him as rapidly as they can manage.
When he is found at the bottom of his basement's concrete steps, it looks like quite the unfortunate accident.
It isn't.
///
Walt and Michael don't fight. They find a condo that accepts dogs, Walt goes to school, and Michael paints.
There's a sort of stiffness, however, a sort of strangeness between the father and son. A lot of things go unspoken; father and son spending more time behind their own closed doors. It's as if they were meant to be healed, but aren't, won't be.
Michael tries to hide Locke's death from his son. It's not as if the two had been best friends, but all the same, he knows the details are a bit morose for a kid. What man throws himself down a flight of concrete steps? The papers and news reporters were calling John Locke crazy. A manic depressant.
There are many things Michael would like to forget about the crash and the island, but there are things that he will always remember. He does not remember Locke being depressed. In fact, Michael remembers him being strong and commanding. He had been the only man among the survivors with the idea to hunt boar after all, hadn't he? And he had walked when they had been on that island, he was positive of that. Locke hadn't used a wheelchair then.
So what had turned him? Was it the silence? The forced silence? They are all dealing with that, aren't they?
It makes him feel guilty. Locke had gotten Vincent back for Walt, and in a way Michael wasn't willing to forget. He had seemed like a good man, albeit a tiny bit creepy.
And now he is dead.
Michael chooses to shield Walt from this, letting the boy forget the crash and his short time on the creepy island.
But Walt knows. Michael isn't exactly sure when the boy discovers this tidbit of information, but the knowledge doesn't seem to trouble him. As a matter of fact, it's quite the opposite actually. They're talking about school, Walt stroking Vincent's fur lazily. He simply says, "John Locke is dead."
Michael is taken back, but doesn't let it show. It doesn't matter anyway because Walt is still stroking Vincent's head, his face relaxed and at ease. "It wasn't suicide, you know."
"What are you talking about, son? What else could it be?"
Walt looks up sharply then. "They did it. It's because Locke broke that contract."
"You listen to me and you listen well. Even if it were true – "
"It is true. Just like they killed Kate," he interrupts.
Michael rubs his eyes in frustration, blue paint smudged loudly between his knuckles. "We can't do anything about it. We can't say anything about it. We signed that contract and we – "
"I know Dad," he interjects again. "I won't say anything."
In a minute, Michael asks Walt about the rest of his day and they continue on as if their previous conversation never took place. Walt may have only known his real dad for a short amount of time (and he doesn't even like him all that much), but he owes him this, this sham of a perfect life.
Michael paints, Walt goes to school. And in this semblance of normalcy, the both of them almost believe how much they love one another.
///
For the rest of his life, people will ask Hugo Reyes the same question.
"Why'd you do it?"
And he will not have an answer.
The fact that he takes all the money in his bank account and donates it to some children's hospital is something that has the media going crazy. And because he refuses to be interviewed, they follow him for a year.
His parents are proud, despite their initial disappointment. And Hurley himself has never been happier. He works from nine to five in a pharmacy, lives in a one-bedroom apartment, and sometimes, throughout the year he receives thank you letters and colored drawings from kids his money has saved.
And that makes him feel good.
///
The baby comes in the middle of the night, rain pounding sharply against the window of their hotel room. Sawyer is in the next bed over, snoring lightly, mouth agape, when Claire wakes with a start. Her swollen belly feels tight and uncomfortable and ripples with tiny waves of pain. Her legs are sticky and wet. While Claire may not know anything about babies and birth, she's very aware that her water has broken.
"Sawyer," she whispers, sitting up and wincing in pain. He mutters a 'wha' and he rolls over to face her, his eyes fluttering open.
"It's… I think it's time," she says quietly, surprisingly able to keep the fear from creeping into her voice.
He bolts out of bed, stubbing his toe on the dresser in the process and shouting a curse into the dark. Pulling on a shirt and jeans haphazardly, he helps her out of bed, his hand a reassuring comfort on the small of her back.
It's when they get to the lobby of the hotel, a desk clerk phoning for a taxi, when she realizes there's something wrong. The contractions are coming too fast and there is suddenly a large circle of blood staining the seat of her pajama bottoms.
"Sawyer," she says before collapsing in his arms, white as a ghost.
Everything that happens next happens in flashes. She remembers the drip of the rain as Sawyer runs her to the yellow cab, the urgency in his voice as he yells the hospital's name at the cabbie, the squealing of the tires as they speed away from the curb, the thumpa-thump of the windshield wipers (like a heartbeat), the warmth of his hand as he smoothes it along her brow. There is a white stretcher awaiting her and she hits it hard, losing Sawyer's grip for a moment. Her blue eyes roll until they find him and she clutches at his hand with as much strength as she can muster. There is a gloved hand between her legs as they race along a brightly lit hallway. When it pulls away, Claire numbly realizes she's hemorrhaging.
She doesn't remember anything after that.
When she wakes next, her mouth and lips are terribly dry. She feels lethargic and hot, and there is a single large tube tugging at her hand. But that's nothing compared to the white-hot fire stretching across the flesh of her lower belly.
Her flat belly.
Sawyer is sitting in a plastic chair beside her bed, eyes opened wide, seemingly staring at nothing. He looks exhausted.
He sees her stirring and leans in real close, kissing her forehead. "You need anything?" It's the way he kisses her. There's something strange, as if he's waiting to tell her something, to break the news as easily as he can. And then she remembers all that blood and the horrible feeling that something had been wrong comes rushing back.
"He's dead, isn't he." It is not a question.
Before he answers, before he even nods his head gravely, she lets out a huge gulping sob. Claire pulls him to her, ignoring the pain that pulsates along her belly and clutches at his shirt. Her empty womb aches, something like a phantom pain slashing through her and she cries harder against his chest. He lets her cry for as long as she needs to, not caring that the shirt will be ruined. And when she's through, tired from the blood loss and exertion, he crawls into bed with her and lies with her for the rest of the night while she sleeps, her fingers still curled around the wet fabric of his shirt.
Four days later, they leave LA together. Now she knows he was always meant to take care of her, just like she was meant to take care of him, the loss of her baby binding them together.
///
Sun leaves Jin in the middle of the day while he's at a job interview. It's a sunny, hot day with random bouts of rain much like the storms they had seen on the island. She rents a red convertible, leaves the top down and drives east. She's always wanted to see New York City.
She turns around three times, flip-flopping between her choices, but eventually continues on her way. Her hair is flying in the wind and she is singing along with the radio. Carefree.
She looks forward to a life where her husband won't come home in the middle of the night with blood soaked hands, throwing her endless amounts of presents as a way of forgiveness.
Sliding her entire cardigan off, she lets the sun hit her shoulders and realizes she'll never have anyone tell her to button up ever again.
Jin comes home from his job interview, expecting his wife to be there with open arms and congratulatory kisses. He clutches an expensive bottle of champagne in one hand, his car keys in the other. He is whistling. He is happy.
He has the job.
But there is nothing that greets him except for silence. He waits in this silence, champagne still clutched in his hand (it's warm now), keys still in his tight grasp. He waits all night for a wife that doesn't appear. And when the blazing sun rises, shining through the opened shades of his living room, he stands. Jin throws the champagne away in his trash bin, rests his car keys on his living room table, and goes upstairs to his bedroom to his shower.
And he gets ready for work.
///
It's when he's sliding her orange thong down past her parted knees when Sayid finally remembers why she seems so familiar.
"You were on the plane."
Her blonde hair is thrown back against the pillow, her red lips parted, cheeks flushed pink and he can see she's having a hard time remembering anything. She is shirtless; the only piece of clothing remaining now is her black skirt, what with her underwear already clamped tightly in his right hand.
"What are you talking about?" She is breathless, frustrated.
"The island. Flight 815," he says.
She swallows, runs a hand through her mussed locks. "We aren't supposed to talk about that."
"Don't you ever wonder…? Why we even had to sign those contracts in the first place? What really happened to John Locke?"
Shannon forcefully flips Sayid, so that she is on top straddling his waist. "No." And she kisses him, slowly coaxing his tongue into her warm mouth.
Afterwards, she doesn't stay. Grabs both heels in one hand and stumbles her way across the carpeted floor to the hotel door. He carefully looks at her disheveled appearance, squinting at her in the dim light. He realizes that she is crying, silently. Big, fat black tears slide down her pink cheeks, streaking her blush.
"We weren't supposed to leave."
He isn't so sure which of them says it first. But she is gone, the hotel door slamming behind her.
And Sayid never sees her again.
"Everything is going well?"
"If by 'well' you mean no one else has broken the contract, then yes, everything is going well."
"Where'd James and the pregnant girl go?"
"Out of California. The baby died, you know."
"Those things happen." A pause. "And Kwon?"
"New York. Left her husband." She clicks, types a few words and then turns to look at him. "Should I send him out to get them back?"
"No. We won't have to worry about them. Make sure Sayid is followed extra closely, though. We don't need another John Locke."
"Of course."
He turns to leave, the slight opening of the door illuminating her dark workspace. "Oh, and Juliet?"
"Yes, Ben?"
"That baby was never supposed to live."
And he turns and leaves.
End.