Chapter 7: Charlie doesnt know where Brooklyn is/ Jack's reasons why

"Charlie, where's Abraham?" Kate asked in a steady voice, trying to stay calm but thinking the worst. Her fears were only solidified when Charlie answered her with a bewildered "Abraham?"

It was, for that particular moment, the worst thing he could have said to Kate. In truth, he simply did not know that this was the baby's new name.

"SAWYER!" Kate shouted, frantic now.
Sawyer was by her side in a second, asking what was wrong. "Abraham's missing!" she said.
"Abraham Lincoln?" Charlie asked. "He's dead."

"What did you say, boy?" Sawyer asked, grabbing two fistfuls of the scrawny man-child's shirt.
"Abraham Lincoln's bloody dead!" the stringy-haired, pug-nosed Brit shouted, because Sawyer was shouting, and he figured maybe Sawyer wouldn't kill him if he shouted. It wasn't very logical but it was the failed musician's only type of logic.

"Not Lincoln. Brooklyn!" Sawyer yelled. "Where the hell's Brooklyn!"
"It's in California, alright! California!" the geographically-challenged shrimp stammered, tears forming at the corners of his eyes. "What's all this got to do with me!"

Sawyer shoved him away and turned to face Kate, grabbing her shoulders and looking her straight in the eye. "We're going to find him, Freckles," he said, trying to sound confident but mostly just trying to convince himself. And in a an even more sobering tone, weighed down by the severity of what he was about to say he added, "I'm going into the jungle."

"What for?" the needy, obsessive, sometime-junkie asked, working himself through the crowd from where Sawyer had thrown him.
"Because, Tiny Tim," Sawyer said, " whenever something happens around here we go into the jungle. The Others were coming? We went into the jungle. We need a radio transmission? We went into the jungle. Claire's baby got a rash? we went into the jungle!"

"But what are you looking for? Who's missing?" the writer of the obnoxious one-hit wonder that couldn't ever get out of anybody's head, You All Everybody asked, totally and utterly confused.

Kate ignored him. Something changed in her as she nodded away her worry and put on her game face. She stepped up to Sawyer. "I'm coming with you," she said, as if she'd never been more sure of anything in her life. But before Sawyer could comment on what she'd just said, they heard another voice break through the crowd.

"No you're not."

They turned to see Jack approaching them. He looked like he'd never been more sure of anything in his life either. "I'll let Sawyer come with me. But not you."
At the exact moment of Jack's reemerging superiority complex, the sound of something loud crashing could be heard in the distance. Ten feet away, Lock was surrounded by what looked to be a dozen pots and pans that had just been thrown around in an angry fit of rage.

"Come with you?" Sawyer began to protest, but he was cut off by Kate who had a protest of her own.
"He's my son, Jack. I'm going."
"It's Jose. And no you're not."
"I'm-"
"YOU'RE NOT COMING, KATE."

Kate recoiled as Jack shouted at her face in his highest volume. He started off in the direction of the jungle, leaving Kate looking totally embarrassed, defeated and absolutely incredulous. Of course, she couldn't do anything about it because Jack had just yelled at her and whenever Jack yelled at her she instantly turned into the submissive, meek woman everyone knew she wasn't.

"Don't worry Kate, I'll bring our son back," Sawyer said. "And I'll take the guns."

She could only stand back and watch as Sawyer and Jack went off to look for her missing baby. The Olympics didn't seem all that important now. Nothing was more important the return of her poor, nameless son whom she loved more than anything in the world.

"But why did they go into the jungle to look for him?" Charlie asked, finally catching on. "He's right here."

Charlie pointed to the ground and Kate followed his hand until her eyes rested on her son, sitting on the sand. He looked up at her and smiled.

It would be dark soon but Sawyer and Jack were far from giving up. They'd come this far and there was no way in hell they were turning back without that adorable baby.

The weight of his backpack was slowing Sawyer down but he didn't care. He'd taken the guns because he'd need them to rescue his son. He'd need all the guns. All 42 of them. All the rifles that had straps were resting over his shoulders, the rest of the guns were in his backpack, his pockets, his belt hoops, sticking out of his jeans, his boots and there were about 7 that he held in his arms. And they were not enough.

"What the hell you carryin' in your backpack?" Sawyer asked Jack suddenly. The other man turned, squinted through the trees as if looking for directions and said, "diapers."

"Diapers?"
"He'll need them," was all jack would say.

They walked in silence a little longer, looking in every direction for some sign that they were in the right place until Jack stopped and sat down on a fallen tree.

"What're you doin'?" Sawyer asked. "It's getting dark we gotta keep moving."
"I need to rest," Jack said, dramatically taking the bag filled with fluffy diapers off his shoulder.
Sawyer wasn't having any of this. "I'm leaving."

"Fine, leave. I knew you'd give up."
"I'm leaving you, Jack ass," Sawyer said. "No way I'm taking a break while he's still out there."

Jack sucked his lips against his teeth in that manner that let everyone around him know that he was the most arrogant asshole in the camp. He shook his head and smiled bitterly. "What are you even doing out here, Sawyer?"

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me. I'm trying to figure it out but I just have no clue what your possible motive could be."

Sawyer could only stop and look at him.

"You wanna be the big hero, is that it?" Jack went on.
"Are you kidding me, doc?"
Jack only shrugged, waiting.

Sawyer wasn't sure how to make this any clearer. "My son is missing!" he shouted, hoping that shouting would help get it through Jack's head. "Why the hell are you here?"

Before Jack could explain that he was trying to be a "hero" and that he was "in love with Kate" and that this little rescue party would probably put him on her "good side" and that he might even get a "thank-you-fck" out of it and that Sawyer was really "cramping his style," they heard something in the bushes a few feet away.

Sawyer whipped all the guns in the noise's direction but only Rousseau stepped into the clearing, the ever-present blank expression still fixed on her face.

"The French chick," Sawyer muttered. "Listen, have you seen a little boy? About a year old?"

"A baby?" Rousseau said in a rather dreamy state.

"Yes, a baby," Sawyer continued. "He's got green eyes, freckles, dimples, 4 teeth and blonde hair that curls up in some places sticks straight in others. Have you seen him?"

"What is the child's name?" she asked.

Sawyer frowned. For the first time he was sad that he couldn't definitively say what his son's name was.

"It doesn't matter," he said, walking up to her. He was tired and desperate and he just wanted to see his son again. In his most earnest way he said, "Please tell me you've seen him."

"When I crashed on this island almost 18 years ago, I was already 7 months pregnant," Rousseau said in her dreaded French accent. "I had to deliver the child myself. A girl. Alex," she whispered dramatically.

"I had her with me for a very short time before they took her. The others," she said dramatically once again.

"We know," Jack said, stepping up. "Just tell me where the boy is and we wont have to kill you."

"It was a sunny day when it happened," she continued. "The sun was burning my skin and I feared it would burn my baby's skin too. So I took off my shirt. I wrapped it around her. And then they took her. The Others. They took my child," she paused. "And they took my shirt."

"Where's my son?"

"It was 5 years before I found another shirt to wear. Out in the jungle. I was naked. From the waste up," she said, and here came the dramatic whisper again: "for 5 years."

"Just tell me where the baby is!" Jack yelled.

"I still have not found the baby," she said. "Alex."

"Not Alex!" Sawyer said. "My baby!"

The French woman looked at Jack and Sawyer both. They could just barely see her eyes behind all that hair.

"I was at the beach earlier. They sent me out into the jungle to tell you that they found the baby. Alex."

"Alex?"

"I mean, your baby. Whatever his name is."

Sawyer's face lit up while Jack just seemed sad that he wasnt the one to have found him.

Sawyer immediately started going back to the beach and Jack soon followed at a much slower pace.

"Alex!" Rousseau shouted. "Is a beautiful name!"