Title: Fall Into The Light
Author: GlowFish
Fandom: Lost
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Ana Lucia/Sawyer, Ana Lucia/Sayid
Summary: Life certainly is not what it was twenty-four hours ago
Warnings: Mostly mild swearing; I'll up the rating if it gets any worse. I don't know Ana Lucia's mother's real name, so sorry for that mistake; Totally un-beta'd so all the mistakes are mine. Feel free to comment. Flames will be used to roast marshmallows. Thanks!
Disclaimer: If I owned Lost, d'you think this story would even be necessary?
"So the world's still out there?"
--Desmond Hume to John Locke, S2E2: Adrift
I.
"I'm sorry."
Whispered words of pain before a loud, earth-shattering pop. And then she felt it, something hot and metallic burrowing into her chest with the unrelenting mindlessness of a thing built to maim, built to kill. One moment of agony, one moment of pain. Louder pops. A gasp of surprise. A body slumping to the floor somewhere beyond her, but the world was already growing dark, and getting darker by the minute.
"Oh God."
Moments ticking off into moments ticking off into eternity. Darkness unending, surrounding her on all sides, drawing closer and closer as light faded from her eyes. One moment, then two and the pain dissipated into numbness and then into nothing. Nothing all at. Cold. Chill. And nothing.
"I'm so sorry."
And then her world went black.
Eyes open. Eyes closed. Brief catches of memories that fade into darkness. Voices.
Ana, hold on!
Amber lights. Red flashes, and the glaring whirl of blue. A man in white speaking into a walkie-talkie and the pulse of a heart monitor going berserk.
Ana! Hold on! Just-Just hold on!
An explosion. Wind whirling like the mind boggling, dizzying topsy-turvy world of a Dorothy being transported to Oz. A whirlwind of confusion. Screams. An airplane crash landing, and water rushing into lungs. Going under and the lulling stillness and silence of an ocean swallowing hot metal, plane engines and people alike.
Hold on! Please!
The whir of an ambulance and the paddles of a defibrillator. Clear! Shock. And a pulse. Life. Life fading. Men in white, and a man talking on his walkie-talkie. Man down. Man down. We need assistance here. Man down. Blood. Blood trickling from veins, potent red waters of life. Man down. Amber lights. Red flashes, and the glaring whirl of blue.
Ana! Ana-Lucia, can you hear me?
Hot beaches. Glowing sand. Whispers. Whispers. Strangers in a jungle world, on a mysterious island. Fear. The first night, devils from the thicket come, wearing the masks of the faces of men, and only the good ones were taken.
Ana, please wake up! Wake up!
Doctors crowded around. Cops in blue, in uniform, in civvies. Her mother weeping in the waiting room. Heart monitor stopping. Starting again. Stopping. Starting again.
Ana...Ana, please...
Hold on.
Hold on.
Eyes closed. Eyes opening. Eyes closed.
Eyes closed...
When next she woke it was not to the rusted roof of an underground hatch, but to the harsh fluorescence of blinding white hospital lights. There was pain in the center of her chest, as if she had been hit by a freight train. She gave a sharp gasp, shut her eyes and waited the pain out.
"Ana?" A voice floated to her ears from the world beyond. Soft, soothing, familiar. Her eyes flew open and she beheld the face of...
"Danni?"
His wide mouth broke into a relieved grin. He looked somewhere over his shoulder and called," She's awake. Thank God, she's awake."
She lifted her head slightly to look. Her mother and her partner, Big Mike, were coming into her hospital room with equal looks of relief etched into the tired wrinkles and creases of worry. She frowned and tried to sit up quickly, a question of alarm on her lips, but before she could utter her confusion, pain rushed from her chest to her brain, frazzling her nerves with agony. She hissed in pain, hand going to her chest and finding bandages tightly wound about her ribcage and breasts.
"Jeez, Ann," Danni exclaimed, hands reaching out to grab hold of her shoulders and push her back down into bed. "You've been shot. Lie down." She looked up then and recoiled, hissing again in pain and glared at him with eyes heavy and heated with pain, confusion and a touch of anger.
"Ana-?" Her mother stepped forward, brow creased in confusion. "Meja, are you alright?"
"What's--" she struggled to speak, but her voice came out coarse as if it hadn't been used in a long while. She cleared her throat and tried again. "What's-What's going on? Why are you here? Where am I?"
Her partner swore as her mother tried to approach her, glancing at Danni as she did, before turning to her daughter and holding her hands out in a placating gesture.
"Ana--"
"What the hell is going on!" Ana Lucia cried, clutching her chest as a spike of renewed pain flared. She winced and backed away from her mother's hands, glaring at all of the room's other occupants with the predatory look of a caged animal. Her eyes darted this was and that, seeing only one exit. The door. Resting behind her mother--mother? -- Danni, and her partner.
"Annie, meja, you were shot," her mother said quietly, grief evident in her tone.
"That bastard kid," her partner exclaimed. "I wish I could've gotten there sooner, Al. I should've gotten there sooner."
"We almost lost you," Danni said just as quietly as her mother. He looked at her, his brown eyes wide, haunted with dark rings, tell-tale signs of a sleepless night.
She shook her head, confused. "I-I don't understand. The plane crash. The island. I was shot. I was shot."
Her mother shot her a funny look. "Ana? What plane crash? Do you know where you are?"
Ana looked around, face clouding with uncertainty. Clearly, she was in a hospital. The linoleum floors reflected the fluorescent lights, and the room had the sterile feel of cleanliness that she had always hated about hospitals. But she didn't know how she had gotten here, wherever here exactly was. The last thing she remembered...The last thing she remembered...
"Where's Michael? And-And--" she frowned, struggling. A grey fog was starting to cover her brain, and exact details were becoming sketchy--"Libby? Where's Libby? Is she alright? Michael shot me, and then...then..."
"Michael!" Danni and her mother exclaimed at the same time.
"Was that the kid's name?" Mike growled, his hand rubbing his right thigh where his gun usually was holstered.
"You spoke with him?" Her mother asked in surprise. Ana shook her head emphatically.
"No, No. The island. We were on the island. The plane had crashed and we...we..." Ana's voice trailed off as confusion clouded her mother, Danni's and Mike's faces.
"What-What exactly do you remember, Ana?" Danni asked cautiously.
Ana looked from one face to the other as her brain struggled to piece together the memories that were starting cloud over.
"A plane crash. We-I was on Flight eight-eight fifteen, and we-I was on my way back to Los Angeles. We crashed." Ana frowned. "I was there, with the other survivors of the plane for ninety days. We crashed. Three months. There were these Others, and they took people. Took the good ones. Left the rest of us. I-we-found other survivors. And I-I-I-I was shot. I was shot. And Libby. Shot. In the H-hatch. I was shot." Her voice took on a hysterical note, and her mother stepped forward once again to comfort her daughter. Ana Lucia leapt back, crying out as her chest flared with a vicious stab of pain.
"St-stay back!" her voice was shaking with pain. "Just-Just stay back. What the hell is going on? Why aren't I dead? I was shot. Michael shot me, and...and now, I'm here. And where the hell is here!"
"Just calm down, Ann," Danni said gently, trying to calm her. "Just calm down. It's all right. Your brain is just trying to process the trauma."
"Trauma? TRAUMA!" She laughed bitterly, then winced in pain as every drawn breath sent waves of agony to her brain. "I was shot! I was shot by Michael. Where's Jack? WHERE AM I?"
"You're in the Intensive care ward at St Sebastian's Hospital in Downtown Los Angeles, Ms. Cortez, and could you please keep it down. There are other patients."
Ana stared in shock as her doctor came into her room with fake cheer etched into the lines of his face. The bottom dropped out of her stomach as very real fear laced its way up her spine. Her mother turned to the doctor first with a relieved look, then Danni and then her partner.
"Doctor, thank God, you're here," her mother said, the relief evident in her voice. "She's-She's not in her right mind."
"Is it the shock, doc?" Mike asked, worried. Danni nodded and as one her mother, boyfriend and partner looked to the doctor plaintively. The doctor's smile looked phony to Ana Lucia as she tried to edge away. But there was nowhere to turn, nowhere to go, and the doctor's eyes darted to her with a cold glare that froze her in her place.
"Doctor?"
The man turned back to a very worried Maria Cortez; she apparently had not noticed the glare sent her daughter's way or had misinterpreted it. He smiled his phony smile again.
"No need to worry," he said with a saccharine sweetness to his tone. "Just let me have a word with her."
Her mother looked doubtful and cast a worried glance back at her daughter. Ana pleaded with her mother with her eyes, Don't leave me. Don't leave me alone with him.
The older woman turned back to the doctor. "I don't think--"
"It's shock, Mrs. Cortez. Shock from her...situation. Please. It'll only take a minute."
Maria Cortez was doubtful again, but the doctor flashed her another saccharine smile and motioned to Danni and Mike.
"Please escort, Mrs. Cortez to the waiting area. I'll be out there in one moment. I promise."
Danni nodded, and Ana would've cursed him if the pain in her chest weren't sending wave after wave of agony to her brain. Instead, she glared daggers at him as he and her partner escorted her mother out into the hall, towards the waiting room. The door to her room closed with a thunk that sounded of finality.
And then she was alone.
With him.
"Well, Ana Lucia Cortez, you had a pretty adventurous night, didn't you?"
The doctor turned, and Ana Lucia was face to face with Henry Gale.
Author's Note: Okay, so what do you think? It was a while beofre I could even post a thing like this because quite frankly the damn S2 pissed me off. So, I decided what the hell, why don't I do something to bring her back. Remember, every time you review an angel gets its wings.