Chapter One:

Findings

It was night, late, around ten, Kate guest. The waves crashed gently against her ankles as she walked along the beach. The tide was now ten feet onto the island, which she was smart enough to know was a bad sign. Wreckage had been drug away from the ocean, but tomorrow it was planned to drag it at least a little into the jungle, if not as far as the caves. Suddenly something caught her eye: a bag, floating up to the shore. Reaching down, she picked it up.

The duffel was a dark, royal blue, drenched with water. She pulled off a few strands of seaweed, and struggled with the zipper. The contents inside the back were soaked, except for a box, that Kate was sure contained jewlery. She took out the box, and opened it. What she saw shocked her. A little miniature plane was in the box with a made up flight number 5025. She picked it up, and then noticed a little piece of paper(unharmed by the water) that had been sticking under it. She read the writing- it looked like a card.

'Sammy, good luck on your first flight! Got this for good luck!'

-Love, Aunt Lynn

Good luck? Kate thought. How ironic. But the plane seemed to haunt her, make her paranoid somehow. She looked around, getting the subconscious feeling that someone was watching her. The closest person was a man(she couldn't tell who) watching a girl who was sleeping on the beach, by the fire. She looked back at the plane, and was drawn into the past...

She remembered a door opening and James, her present boyfriend, entering, or at least, he acted like her boyfriend. He'd always be around for love, for money, for dinner. Never to say how he loved her, or to even touch a conversation on a future. So she considered them just friends. Friends who kissed, that was. Rushing into the room, Jams grabbed her, closing the door, pulling her into the center of the room. His eyes were wild with excitement.

"What?" She asked, impatiently. "What?"

"I got you a job," James said proudly.

"You- you what?" Kate asked. "I've been out of work ever since.."

"I know," James said, his hands on her shoulders, "but you can put that behind you because you are now the proud supervisor of the nightshift at Wilamson's Union Bank."

He took her by the shoulders, and for the first time, Kate was too shocked to kiss him.

"Oh my God," she said to herself, "you're serious? This is real?"

"Hell yeah," James said, grinning, "real as gold, sweetheart."

But something about that grin haunted her, and she would have to wait until eleven that night to find out why..

"Night owl?" Someone asked behind her, jerking Kate from her thoughts.

But still, she couldn't help but to smile a little to herself with her back turned to no other than Sawyer, the one man no one else could stand, but the one man that made something inside Kate smile at the most ridiculous of times.

"It's what?" Sawyer asked. "Eleven, eleven thirty?"

"Why do you care?" Kate asked, her back still to him.

"We're about to be engulfed by the blue wonder of the world and all you can do is walk along the edge of it?" He asked.

By the sound, he was coming closer.

"Turning poetic?" She asked him.

She wasn't going to turn around now- no way was Kate going to let him think she might think he was the least bit charming.

"Learn a lot from readin' them books," he said, "even the ones about the bunnies."

Kate shook her head, finally turning around, fighting off the half-smile that was coming on.

"So what are you doing out here, Sawyer?"

"Lookin' for some cigarets," he said.

Sawyer's drawn-out face first became apparent to her then. Was he suffering from withdrawals?

"Just about ran out," Sawyer said.

He reached down, and tore off a piece of grass that was growing in the sand and stuck it in his mouth, like a temporary smoke.

"Figured people wouldn't notice their stuff is missing while they're asleep," he finished.

"Or you could just ask someone," Kate pointed out.

Sawyer laughed, as if saying 'yeah right', but Kate knew enough about him to know that those two words would never come out of his mouth. It was too uncharacteristic.

"You just don't know me, do ya Freckles?" He asked, eyeing her.

She was about to reply, and make a sarcastic comment about why he kept calling her 'Freckles', when there was a rustling in the bushes that lined the sand. They both turned and looked. As expected, there was nothing there. Then there was more rustling, a little louder this time. Kate glanced over at the man who had been sitting by the fireside, only to see that the fire was now burnt out, and the man apparently asleep. The bushes rustled again. This time, Sawyer and Kate slowly stepped forward, but carefully, knowing that they actually weren't that far from the sandline. The leaves rustled again. Kate stepped forward to get a closer look, but Sawyer put a hand out to stop her.

"Stay close, sweetheart," he said, as serious as she figured he could get.

She glared at him, and not about to let him tell her what to do, she begin o step forward. He followed close by her. Suddenly, the rustling began getting softer, traveling back the way it came from. All was quiet again, until a loud sound that sounded of steel moving erose in the night. Or at least, they thought it had, because looking around the beach, no one else had noticed it. Then all was silent again. Sawyer didn't even look at Kate, or say anything. He just ran.

"Sawyer!" Kate called, trying to run after him.

She wondered why none of the others had woken up. Sawyer was running full speed now, and Kate now had no choice but to keep following him, just to prove to herself that she hadn't gone crazy. All through this it felt like a dream. She followed Sawyer as he tore through the jungle, chasing nothing.

Maybe we're both losing our minds, she bagan to think.

Sawyer continued running for a few yards. Kate followed the best she could. Then suddenly he stopped, just right there. He was about to go over the ledge, and caught Kate as well as himself before he did. They looked down, and were startled.

It seemed to be the most magnificent site either of the had seen. It was a waterfall that stood twenty feet off the ground. Bellow was a pool of water that must've been ten feet deep. Even at night, the waterfall glowed. The glow had a way of seducing you, pulling you into it. The glistening water had a way seemed to make the two forget that they were on an island in the middle of nowhere, forget that they were in danger of wild animals, and forget that they had just been arguing. Kate and Sawyer looked at each other, knowing what the other was thinking.

"Jump on three?" Sawyer confirmed.

"Yeah," Kate nodded.

"One," Sawyer began in a low voice that didn't seem to be his, "two.."

He glanced at Kate and took her hand. She didn't know why, but she accepted it. Maybe it was out of fear, or maybe it was on the spur of the moment.

"Three."

The two jumped, holding hands, letting out a scream. Not of fear, but excitement, like two kids riding a roller coaster. They hit the water at the same time, hands breaking a part. The water was neither warm nor cold, but felt perfect, like there was a magic touch to it. They let themselves sink four feet, then floated back up. Sawyer ran his long, wet hair back, pulling it out of his face, as Kate did the same.

"Why did we do that?" Sawyer asked, looking at her.

"I don't know," Kate said, catching her breath.

Sawyer suddenly turned as something bumped into him. Kate did the same, and they soon realized that the waterfall was not just a waterfall. Sawyer picked up what had drifted by him: the top of a seat. Just then, something floated in between them: the bone of an arm. Kate screamed loudly, and Sawyer covered her mouth with his hand, hoping they wouldn't draw any attention. The bone floated on, and Kate calmed down a bit.

"Let's get out of here," Sawyer said, a little spooked.

Kate nodded. Once on land, Kate bent over, coughing up water. Sawyer began to ring out his shirt. Kate began to straighten up, but stopped at another piece of wreckage that floated by: a closed briefcase. It was hard, black, and expensive. Kate bent down, and drug it out of the pool of water.

"What's that?" Sawyer asked, bending down beside Kate.

Kate shrugged. She tried to open it, but it wouldn't budge. Another piece of wreckage floated by, but as it grew closer, Sawyer picked it up. It was no wreckage: it was a gun. He glanced at Kate.

"Gonna tell Jack?"

But she couldn't answer, because she recognized that case, she'd no it from anywhere...

She remembered her short stay in jail, uninformed and cuffed, watching as she was pointed out to the marshal, remembering his briefcase.

She remembered the marshal's hand, placing her file with her name at the top, inside the case and locking it.

And then the marshal's hand dropped the key in his pocket..