"I'll die if I leave." He stared ahead steadily as the other man snorted. "Not that I expect you to care, Jack, I just thought you might have enough deaths on your conscience already."
"You'll die if you leave. Fine. So why don't I just kill you right here? Save you some time and save me from having to watch my back on the ship?"
"Why don't you?" The pause went unfilled, so he continued. "I'll tell you why. It's because no matter how much you hate us, how much you hate me, you can't bring yourself to act on anything other than raw passion, and right now I'm not an immediate threat to you."
"You're wrong."
He fingered his battered jaw. "I doubt it."
"I don't believe you."
"That I don't doubt."
"You are an immediate threat, Ben. You'll be an immediate threat as long as you can still lie, which will probably be as long as you can still breathe. You let me think my people died. You told Alex she was your daughter, that her mother was dead. You swore to your own people nothing was working in the Looking Glass station. You said you were from Minnesota…." Jack laughed, a sharp laugh that was almost a sob.
"You're making a big mistake. You're not supposed to leave this island. We're not supposed to leave. Please, I'm begging you…don't leave things unfinished."
"I don't know what you're trying to do, Ben, but I do know one thing: I'm done listening to you when you start hollering 'Wolf.'"
"And if the wolf comes…?"
"That's on your head."
"Believe me or not, as you like," Ben said. "But if I leave here, I tell you I'll die. And if you leave here, you…you will live to regret it."
Jack shrugged his shoulders. "We'll see." He moved away. "Oh, and Ben?"
"Yes?"
" Don't expect me to come to your funeral."
