Time-Line Setting: Sometime after Collision but before The Hunting Party

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters. I am not affiliated in any way, shape or form with anyone who does.

It had been over eight hours since she last moved. She had been transfixed by the ocean ever since Jack had spoken to her, a sympathetic hand upon her shoulder, his tone lowered, even though everyone already knew what had happened. She had run from the caves to the beach and had sunk down into the sand. She hadn't even cried, she had just frozen.

Everyone was avoiding her, walking behind her, trying to avoid eye contact. They were scared that if she saw them, she would break down. They all knew that she was in shock, but they didn't want her to come out of it. When she did, she would have to cope. It seemed fairer to just let her sit in silence.

They hadn't buried the body. It didn't seem right to do it without her, Sayid had been the one who said that she would need to say goodbye, and everyone had listened to him. He had lost Shannon only the week before.

Michael walked towards Jack who was kneeling in the sand, rummaging through a suitcase. Michael's eyes flickered to the blue sheet that laid upon his friend Jin and he lowered himself to Jack's level.

"What are you doing?"

"We can't leave her like this. She needs to snap out of it, eat something, drink something. She's already in shock, we don't need her dehydrated as well," he looked at Michael and realised that he hadn't answered the question, he sighed heavily, "I'm looking for some anti-depressants."

"But she's not depressed."

"He was her husband Michael, she will be when she comes around." Jack stopped rummaging and pulled out a small orange beaker, half-filled with small white tablets. He read the label, his eyes scrunched in concentration. "This should do." He zipped the suitcase shut and hoisted himself up. Michael followed and their eyes met, confused. The place where Sun had been sitting was empty.

Michael scanned the beach until he saw her long black hair flying loosely in the wind from behind a rock. Without pausing to inform Jack, Michael walked over to her.

She was on her knees at the edge of the water, trailing her fingers through the calm waves as the tears rolled gently down her cheeks. She looked up as Michael approached and he found himself looking away, unable to bring himself to focus on the pain sprawled across her delicate features.

"Jack said that he was fishing?" The pain in her voice made him glance back to her. Their eyes locked together.

"Yeah," Michael wasn't sure what else to say to her. It had been that morning, when he was idly playing with Vincent, bored and desperate to find Walt when he had heard Jin shouting. He had run down to the other edge of the beach to see Jin tangled in his net, away from the shore, struggling to get above the water. By the time he had got there, Jack and Sawyer had already dived in and were swimming to reach him. By the time they managed, Jin had been under the water, failing to resurface for a couple of minutes. Between themselves, they managed to drag him ashore but it was obvious that they had failed. His body was limp and cold, his eyes closed and his mouth open, still filled with water. His frantic screaming was still rebounding around Michael's head, especially because, with Sun's assistance, he had learned how to call for help in English.

"He always fished. I don't understand."

She looked away from Michael, back to the ocean. He had to hold back a sigh of relief. He hadn't been able to make eye contact with her for much longer, every second that passed when she looked at him was another second where he had to force himself to keep his hands by his sides, where he had to force himself not to reach out to her, embrace her in his arms, stroke her hair, feel her face…

He scolded himself internally, he had suffered from these feelings when Jin was alive but it repulsed him that he was still considering letting her know how he felt. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Jack striding up the beach and felt relieved for the distraction. "I have to go," he muttered as he walked away, forcing himself not to look back at her.