Alright. Here is my baby, Dare You to Move. I have been working extremely hard on this one so I hope you enjoy it. It is also posted on LF but I have decided to place it on here as well. This is the best writing I have done in a very long time, but I know it is not perfect. So I accept all opinions on this piece, no matter what you have to say, say it. I apologize for very emotional Kate and somewhat nice Sawyer. I have tried to stay as true to their characters as I can, yet I also decided to make some changes. This takes place after the Season 3 fall finale. It is a wee bit spoilery, so if you have no idea what went on, and don't want to find out, DON'T READ IT. Well, after saying that, I really hope you enjoy.

-Toni


Jack Shephard, man of science now longed to be a man of faith. He wished he could have faith in her when he so clearly couldn't anymore. Just hearing her voice over that walkie-talkie made him break more than he already had. At first, when she had said his name he wasn't quite sure he could respond back. But he did, forcing himself to just let that one syllable escape his lips, let her know he is there. And when she said she couldn't leave without him…he knew how she felt. Had he really agreed with Ben that he was getting off this island if he saved him? How could he just up and leave her like that, when she had been the reason he was still alive on the hell-hole.

Sawyer.

That's why he could leave her, that's why he was going to leave her. He needed to escape from the ora she had about her, it consumed him with all its light and love. The utter pain he felt seeing them together was unbearable. It felt as if his whole world, his whole existence was ripped out right from underneath him. It was worse than anything he had ever experienced. Not with Sarah, and not with his father. And he just knew Ben could see the tears about the cascade down his cheeks after he saw him cradling her, and if Ben would have entered that room a few seconds later they would have surely fallen.

"I CAN'T JACK!" Kate screams, voice shaking worse than before into the walkie-talkie. Her heart was clearly screaming for him, yearning for him, beating for him, about to explode if he didn't get in her arms soon, she could feel it.

"WHY KATE, WHY WONT YOU RUN?" Jack is just getting plain angry at this point. He wants to just throw something to let all his aggression out, but besides valued medical equipment there really is nothing that deserves a good tossing. Except for maybe Ben's body clear across there floor, after all he is the one who got him into this mess to begin with.

"BECAUSE I…" Kate starts but then her eyes dart to Sawyer strained face. She looks at him just long enough to see that he is piercing daggers into her flesh. She knows it would hurt and she didn't want to cause anyone else pain. She had hurt too many in her life she couldn't stand to hurt another. But this could save Jack; this could bring Jack back with them…with her.

"BECAUSE YOU WHAT KATE? WHY WON'T YOU RUN IT? IT'S THE ONLY WAY!" Jack screams yet again into the small device. His hands shaking fiercely as tears are threatening to fall. He is becoming extremely impatient. There goes her damn stubbornness getting in the way again. He would think it would be easy to leave him, easy for her to run; after all that's what she does. Besides, she has Sawyer. He shudders at the thought.

Kate, on the other hand already had tears pooling from her eyes down her soft yet worn cheeks.

Then all Jack could hear was her delicately whisper something. He couldn't make out what she had said, and she prayed no one else had heard either. But unfortunately everyone near the cages heard those words escape from her mouth and watched her actions as she said it. How she clenched the walkie-talkie like it was about to be ripped from her fingers, knuckles turning white from the force. How her salty tears, along with the rain were staining the radio's hard black exterior. And the way her eyes lit up saying it, through all the tears it was still so noticeable. She had said it so soft and gentle, like she was protecting those delicate words from reaching anyone's ears except the tall, handsome, heroic doctor on the other end.

She couldn't meet Sawyer's eyes after that, not knowing if he had heard her or not. Praying he didn't but at the same time hoping he did.

"GO DAMNIT, YOU NEED TO GO." He to the point of begging now. Hoping just this once, she will actually listen. Hoping she understands he is just trying to save her.

"Jack please don't make me go. I just can't. I can't go without you." Kate's on the verge of complete hysterics at this point. Everyone around notices she looks as if she's about to just burst into a million pieces. This is just too much for her to handle.

"Kate you have to. Get yourself and Sawyer out of there. I will be okay." He lied. Knowing as soon as Ben was well, he sure as hell wouldn't be.

"What if you're not?" Kate asks sensing the uncertainty in his voice.

"You have to believe that I will. Remember to radio me." The line went dead. He needed to shut it off, he couldn't listen to her anymore otherwise he might have spontaneously combusted right there in the middle of the operating theater. Hearing her break over leaving him was too much, especially with the nagging voice in the back of his head constantly reminding him of Sawyer and of how he was leaving. He was going home.

"Jack? JACK? NO!" Kate pleaded into the hundred small holes on the sleek black communication device. Hoping he could somehow hear her again. Hoping he would turn it back on just so she could hear his voice one more time, praying it wouldn't be the last.

And then suddenly it came back on like all her hopes had been answered for that fleeting moment.

"J…Jack?" Kate asks praying to anyone that would listen that it was in fact him on the other end.

Then she hears his strong, sturdy voice. "One." She takes in the sound. The soothing tone and the way just that single word could calm a thousand of her worries.

"T…two." She says shakily into the device. Hands and body both trembling. Her entire being needing the feeling of his safe arms wrapped around her tiny figure. She would give anything for the chance to be lost in those arms, just once.

"Three." They say together. Fear resounding in both their voices.

"Four." They speak together again, a bit stronger than the last. Sawyer watches on intrigued, enthralled, and yet enraged at how hearing just one word from Jack could send her into a fit of sobs or calm her entire being.

"Five." They say with strength and courage. Something neither had felt since that day on the docks when they peered into each others soul. Taking each other in one last time, not knowing if they would ever get that chance again.

"I'm coming for you." Kate says quietly but loud enough for Jack to hear.

"Don't." He bluntly states. "It's not safe."

"But Jack I can't…"

"We are not starting this again Kate, just go." He says harshly as he turns off the small black box in his hands. His head drops to his chest, feeling that probably will be the second to last they ever spoke again. He had a feeling once he saved Ben it was the end for him. Hell he pretty much knew it was the end.

She didn't stop sobbing after he had shut off the speaker. Sawyer just watched her, wondering where her heart truly lied, but at the same time having a feeling it wasn't with him. He watched as she held the walkie-talkie protectively close to her chest like it was a small child she was keeping safe from the winter chill. He knew they would have to kill her to get that thing back, and even then they would have to try to pry it from her cold dead fingers.

Suddenly, just hearing his voice gave her more strength than she thought she had left in her. After being worked and starved she was so frail and she knew it. But somehow she felt like her old self. She quickly elbowed the guy's nose who was standing behind her with so much force he fell to the ground unconscious. Sawyer took this as his opportunity to attack Pickett, something which he had been thirsting to do ever since that first beating.

Sawyer first slugged him hard in the stomach, quickly moving upwards to his face. He reeled punches one after the other until he heard a crack. Pickett had nothing against the anger Sawyer had in those two fists of his. He beat the hard-ass man to a bloody pulp.

Kate runs over to him, having knocked out two other men with a large rock, and grabs him up off the ground. Sawyer takes Kate in his arms, thankful they are okay. He realizes she doesn't return the hug and almost immediately pushes him away grabbing two guns and some ammo off of the others. She heads off in the opposite direction of where they are supposed to go.

"Now where in the hell do you think you're goin'?" Sawyer sneers. "Or do I even have to ask?"

Kate glares at him. "I'm going to get him, I'm going to save him." She states with pure determination.

"Of course you are…but you heard what the Doc said, it's not safe."

"That's why we have these." Kate says tossing a gun towards Sawyer. He grabs it and then starts to shake his head to protest but she's already over thirty steps ahead of him.

"Death mission five-hundred and twenty seven since we've been on this God-damned island." Sawyer states to himself.


Jack grabs Juliet roughly by the arms and pulls out the gun he stole holding it to her neck.

"Where did you get…"

He cuts her off by pushing the cold metal further into her neck. He drags her down the corridor to the newly abandoned surveillance room. He pans his eyes over the many screens until he sees' her figure. He recognizes her in an instant. She's going the wrong way, she's coming for him.

"Damn it Kate." Jack says flattered and disappointed at the exact same time.

"She sure seems hell bent on getting you back, Jack." Juliet sneers.

He turns Juliet so he can look in her eyes. "Live together, die alone."

Juliet slowly nods. "You know they are going to go after them. Danny won't give up. She will get hurt and he will get dead, or possibly both just dead."

Jack pauses and looks down, defeated. "If they so much touch a hair on her…"

He's cut off by Juliet's lips forcefully on his own. For a second Jack almost gives in, until her face crosses his mind and he pushes Juliet harshly away.

"Why did you do that?"

"I don't know. It just seemed…"

"IT SEEMED LIKE WHAT?" Anger rages through Jacks voice now. He pins her against the wall. She can see the vein in his forehead bulging.

Juliet stays strangely calm. "What do you see in her Jack?"

His eyes get soft but his grip doesn't lessen.

"I mean she's a fugitive, she killed her father, got her childhood sweetheart killed, was a complete whore on the run, always using men, and she never told anyone her real name." She pauses as she notices his grip starting to loosen. "With the exception of you." She gives a sly smirk. "Tell me Jack, did you see them?"

Suddenly his strength is back and she is shoved into the wall.

"I guess she made her choice." Jacks head falls down as a single tear leaks from his eye, not going unnoticed by Juliet. "I thought she loved you like you love her. Poor Jack Shephard, always the one getting left, never doing the leaving. No one ever stays, do they Jack?" She stops and brings her hand to his, caressing the callous palm with her thumb. "I will never leave you Jack, I will stay. I will not break you Jack Shephard."

His hands fall to his side as he takes in a deep breath, sighing at the air escapes his unsteady lungs. "Go back to the room…now." The words seethe out of his mouth as he raises the gun to her head yet again. Juliet simply nods as the two head back to the operating theater.


There is a rustling in the bushes. Kate and Sawyer's heads fly towards the disturbance. The young girl they've come to know as Alex springs out and runs up to Kate, grabbing her roughly by the arms. "You can't save him now; you have to run for it." The young girl pleads to Kate.

She looks at the girl in horror as her lip begins to quiver.

"I will do all in my power to get the Doctor back to you, but I cannot make any promises. They are going to be extremely upset about this and who knows what they will do to him."

"Freckles we have to leave." Sawyer says looking back towards the cages where the men are slowly starting to regain consciousness.

"No. Not without Jack?" Kate says peering into the young girl's eyes then flipping around to face Sawyer. "He wouldn't leave me."

"You have to leave him behind, you can't save him." Alex states grabbing Kate's arms tighter. "I promise you I will try everything to get him out of here."

Tears are still pouring from Kate's eyes, each one feeling like another piece of hope being ripped from her soul.

"Common freckles?" Sawyer grabs her and begins to drag her in the direction of the beach.

"Wait, start going north until you hit the purple flower trees, then take a left until you reach the shore and then a right to find your camp."

Sawyer looks at her quizzically. "Well Pocahontas, hate to be the one to burst your bubble but we're on a different island."

"No we're not…cowboy…It was just a trick to keep you from escaping." She starts to sneak away so no one can see her. "Be careful." She calls out once before she disappears into the brush.

"Of course it was." Sawyer drones out latching himself onto Kate's arm. She is still a complete mess, holding onto that device for dear life.

They start to run just in time. Pickett wakes up fully and heads back to the hatch to get more guns. "What are you doing, he is going to let Ben die if you do anything to them." The man who held Kate at gunpoint earlier states.

Pickett ignores the man and heads for the gun cabinet.