Chapter 10
Jack in the box
Stopping one foot from sprinting in front of the other right now is perhaps the hardest thing Kate has ever had to do.
Kate has led a wicked life, against most people's standards – she has lived the worst years of his life on the run, always with one eye over her shoulder and the other on the never ending road ahead, heart blackened and cynical, her stomach in perpetual knots. Kate has never rested on an easy conscience at night. Her pain is a constant ache in the back of her mind, and the love she has known has been the root of it all. Love for her mother, scarred physically and unfathomably deeper by Wayne, and her love for Tom, untainted through even the darkest times, a love so deep and all consuming it had nearly been the death of her.
Kate is a woman of extremes – and when she had turned in a car seat what seems like another life ago to see Tom's lifeless face staring back, a part of her had died that night with him. Because it was her fault, irreversibly and undeniably. She would never be the same. There were no takesy backsey's like when they were six and Tom had pushed Katie over, skinning her knees and calling her clumsy, and how she'd cried,
Tommy! You take that back! Take it back!
And he had done, because all good men (and boys) had their moments of madness, and maybe he'd loved her, even then.
Takesy backsey's Katie. Din't mean it.
But takesy backsey's have been left in her scarred past, defunct and useless… and now there is no calling time out of a crazy situation which had spiralled out of her control long ago.
She told herself then, as she ran away leaving Tom behind like a rat slinking into the shadows, that she would never allow herself peace. She didn't deserve it. And she would never let anybody close to her again – because once they had their pickaxe holds in her fragile heart, she was vulnerable – trip over love, you can get up. Fall in love and you fall forever.
She has tripped over Jack. As she finally looks in through a steamy pane of glass on him, it feels like she is that six year old again, clambering up with skinned knees and scalding tears, knowing he too has been interfered with, damaged by these Others, Dharma…
"Wait!" Alex snags her arm before she can open the door and pulls her into the shadows. Kate glares dangerously at her, the need to find Jack, to make sure he's safe almost unbearable. But to her annoyance Alex doesn't flinch – and Kate notices something strange. When Alex isn't around Sawyer, she is different – she's no longer a gangly, awkward teenager… but colder somehow –
Next time, they will expect more co-operation. You are on your first warning.
"You have to let me asses him." Alex says earnestly, "If he is too far gone, we'll have to knock him out."
"Is that really necessary -!"
"If the Dharma Agents have full control of his cerebral facilities they'll instantly know you've escaped." Alex draws a hypodermic out of her backpack, and pins Kate with a sadly resolute stare, "Whatever he knows, they'll know. And however much he'll hate it, he'll lead the Agents straight to us."A steely resolve clamps Alex, and she says, "So is this really necessary? You decide."
Kate takes the hypodermic suspiciously. 'What's in it?"
"Its called the Ultimate Solution."
"I didn't ask what it was called, I asked what was in it --"
But Alex has moved inside the cell already, leaving Kate to look after her worriedly…
How can you trust her!
As she stands in the doorway, watching Alex enter through a glass blast door, her stomach turns. Her survival instincts are fined tuned after so long on the run – and her stomach dives in that sickening way she has come to fear, as her heart begins to race and her mind yammers at her that something is about to go very wrong here –
Mind overtaking rational will, Kate dodges into the holding cell.
Inside, head throbbing from the continual roar of the air conditioning, she looks uneasily to a workstation set up outside Jack's room, fixed with video monitors and computers. It looks like whoever left from here left in a hurry – their coffee is still steaming in the lamplight. She is adept at seeing the details, and they don't add up now. Where is everybody…?
"What are you talking about!" The scientist stutters fearfully as he looks down the barrel of the gun… "Please – look, I'm not here to hurt you. My names J.P Garrett, please -- be reasonable here!"
"Reasonable?" Sawyer advances with fire in his eyes, "You guys dive into my brain, ditch me with a damn radio in there and you wanna reason with me!"
"The bandage --" Garrett's eyes fly from the gun and light up on Sawyers head, "You're a specimen! How did you escape --"
But Sawyer's eyes are distracted by that damn carton of food, discarded on the floor – Christ, he's sweating his ass off, it's thrown him completely –
I'll go with the HOT
With an angry yell he stamps on the shrimp, grinding it into the metal gantry – and the electrical pulse in his head kicks up into overdrive, piercing deep, stabbing –
A printer spews out a continuous glut of paper into an overflowing bin, and as she approaches it, Kate's head twinges – the electrical pulse shivers through her as she picks up the paper…
Co-codamol and rest that's all need
Don't look back no head hurts
Boy in A&E need to get his (X-rays?)
Pages and pages of half-translated thought processes. Horrified, Kate's eyes travel up through the glass… and as the paper slips from her hands and she steps inside the bright white room, all rational thought in her dies.
Alex stands over Jack's body, looking down nervously. Kate approaches that bed as though moving through quicksand. She can barely move forth. Electrodes are attached to his forehead, and as the machines whir over him, she notices he isn't unconscious – his eyes stare forth blankly, locked someplace far away from her –
As Alex quickly removes the electrodes, Kate kneels by him at a loss, and knows she has to be strong. Jack has always been her rock, her moral compass and now he needs her to be strong.
"Jack?" She says softly, stroking the side of his face, unable to believe how haggard he looks, how haggard and sick, "Jack, can you hear me?"
Alex looks down in shock, "No! No, don't wake him up --!"
Jack's eyes flicker – and blearily fix on Kate.
"James --!"
The Beretta flies back to fix on Garrett's chest before he can approach Sawyer, who stares at him incredulously. The scientists hands fly back up and he says quickly,
"James Ford. That's you, isn't it?"
The shit is hitting the fan, Sawyer knows it, but is helpless but to demand in bewilderment, "How the hell do you know!"
"I know many things." Garrett giggles nervously, "My team have been studying you for a long time --"
"Why?" Sawyer advances, eyes burning, "Why me? Why the Doc, why Kate?"
Suddenly Garrett smiles. Widely… and from his mouth, Sawyer hears that familiar whisper, voice hitching up through blood and haemorrhaging insides --
"You don't have any idea what you're doin', do ya?"
And as Sawyer stares back in horror, it is no longer Garrett standing in the glaring hall. Frank Duckett stands before him now, no longer a voice or an illusion, but here, really here, dripping wet with a bloody flower blossoming out from a bullet hole in his chest –
Sawyer grits his teeth and doggedly fixes his arm taunt – it wants to shake – "You got three seconds to tell me what you've done to me --"
Delicious relief rockets through every fibre of Kate's being as she laughs down at him in uncontrollable release, "Jack…!"
But Alex pivots forwards, urgentlytrying to pull her away, "Don't talk to him – Kate!"
Jack looks up in shock, recognition speeding through him. "Kate… Kate, are you okay!"
And no sooner has Jack recognized Kate, all hell breaks loose. Red hazard lights explode on, bathing everything in a bloody haze –
-- and emergency klaxons shriek down the hall. Sawyer freezes, desperately grappling onto his nerves, and for a moment he just stares at Duckett, bathed in blood red light, a vision straight from the pits of his darkest nightmares is staring down the barrel of his gun with malevolent malice as a tannoy wails --
"Warning! Specimen insubordination! Warning!"
Wordlessly Sawyer shoves the man roughly toward the cell, heart pounding with adrenaline –
As Kate helps Jack sit, she hugs him tightly as the klaxons blare, "I'm okay, can you get up, can you stand --"
"I've been going out of my mind --" Jack stands woozily, furiously trying to get his bearings quickly, "They told me you were dead. That they'd killed you --"
"It's okay, I'm here --" She slings his arm over her shoulder, and she's in her element now, amidst the madness somehow her mind flicks into automatic, "Come on we've got to get out of here --"
Suddenly Sawyer barrels in -- Alex immediately hikes up her gun –
"Easy girl!" Sawyer ducks as a bullet ricochets over his head, "HEY!" He yells angrily – then gestures quickly, "Come on! Company's coming!"
As they run down the halls Kate sights Garrett and yells heatedly, "What are you bringing him for!"
Sawyers eyes flash at her, "You told me not to shoot him!"
"I didn't say bring him with you!" She says in furious impatience, "Damn it Sawyer we're supposed to be keeping quiet!"
"Look little Miss Stealth, you wanna yell at me about being quiet after we escape the alarms YOU set off!" She glares at him and he smiles at her. Lord, he loves it when she gets mad --
As Alex quickly leads them down flights of stairs, Sawyer flips a glance to Jack – and though he'll never admit it, it reassures the hell out of him that the good doctor's still breathing. And hell, he don't look so bad! Don't know what all the damn fuss was about –
"Hey Doc! Some rescue huh?"
"If good is alerting the entire complex to your rescue, then yes, well done!" Jack says, and as Sawyer turns back, he realizes Duckett has gone. Garrett anxiously runs alongside him again, his wet eyes glowing with fear. Man, this creeps him out…
Kate yells to Garrett, "Can't you stop the alarms!"
"I can't!" The scientist wraggles an accusing finger back in Jacks direction, "I didn't set them off! He did!"
"Forget it --" Sawyer says, shoving Garrett roughly down the last flight of stairs, "Pork pie's gonna get us the hell out of here --"
"What!" The scientist quivers wildly, "Are you insane?"
"You really wanna find out Jello?" Sawyer jams his gun in Garretts back –
"No – you don't understand." Garrett looks to Jack urgently, "If you take him with you, he'll lose his mind – you all will! He needs the medication." His frantic eyes spear Sawyer and Kate with self righteous ire, "You two will understand. This time tomorrow night you'll understand and you'll wish you'd listened –"
"We're leaving." Sawyer says pressing the gun into his forehead, "Move it."
"There's no way –" Garrett stutters painfully, "Even if I get you out of here, they'll follow, you'll never escape --"
Thundering footsteps on the stairs above their heads make them break into a sprint.
"Where does this take us?" Kate demands from Garrett who wracks his brains, puffing,
"Subterranean levels 45 to 60 --"
"Subterranean!" Sawyer bellows, "You're supposed to be getting us out!"
Gunfire strafes from above and they hug the walls. Flying chips of metal whine about and the stench of gunpowder nearly makes Sawyer gag in such close quarters. He returns fire for the hell of it as Alex suddenly grinds to a halt and drags him down into a side corridor. Before he can protest, the others have followed and she is pulling up a panel of the flooring gantry --
"Where the hell are you going now!" He says in disbelief. She's trying to kill him, he swears it -- if it ain't vents or crazy needles, it's this. As she heaves the panel aside he peers beneath it, where a small cavity runs beneath the light fittings. Beneath the open electrical light fittings.
"Lordy buttercup, there's a helluva sting in those bad boys!" He says uncertainly but she is already down and he is left to help down Jack, Kate refuses all help as usual, and he damn near breaks Garrett's neck getting him down. But finally, just as the footsteps have grown into an all-enveloping roar, as the whickering bullets rise behind him, he takes a deep breath – and lowers himself down into the cavity.
He damn near fries himself on the power lines, but as he drops down and pulls the panel back overhead, he lands besides Kate. It's a goddamn sewage pipe. Wonderful.
"Lookin' good Freckles," He smiles at her, covered in sludgy water but she looks to him worriedly.
"Are you okay? You looked like you'd seen a ghost back there." Sawyer looks to her in amazement – when did she get so damn good at reading him? He loves it in her suddenly, the fact that in the middle of all the chaos, she had noticed. But he catches the others eyes staring back at them awaiting, and Alex holds a finger to her ruby lips – just as thundering footsteps pound over their heads, casting stark black shadows over them.
"Check everywhere," A furious command pierces the air, and Sawyer's blood slowly boils. Henry Gale, that sonofabitch – "They won't have gone far, and for God's sake crack Jack's mind! I don't wanna see anymore of those fucking stars okay? The other two will take time, but you've had time to work on cracking Jack, Agent Blue."
Footsteps directly over Sawyers head, "I apologize Sir. My men will work harder at deciphering him --" Suddenly a soft crackling, like a voice speaking over a head set, and Agent Blue barks, "They are heading for levels 25-45! Come on!"
The footsteps thunder off, and Sawyer looks to Jack in astonishment through the darkness. Something cold is settling around his heart, some terrible realisation… and although he hears himself asking, he suddenly ain't sure he wants to know the answer...
"You have a hand in that, Doc…?"
Jack only looks back to him calmly... and Sawyer thinks maybe Alex was right. Something about Jack isn't the same – but he can't put his finger on what…
"They know what I'm thinking, Sawyer. So…" Jack's eyes grow faraway, "I just tell them what I want them to think. Sometimes it works."
Something about the distance in Jack's dark eyes gives Kate the shivers. It's a look she can't even begin to understand, so unlike him... she exchanges a look with Sawyer, who she knows has picked up on it as well...
"Thank God this is one of them," Alex says trudging forth up the tunnel, "Come on. I have some of the medication stored topside; we'll grab it when we get out of here."
"Topside!" Sawyer scoffs, "You're talkin' like we're in the damn army, G.I Jane --"
"Topside," Alex insists, shooting a glare back to him, "As in above water."
Sawyer, Kate and Jack crunch to aunited stop in shock. And it is Jack, closest to Alex, who gathers himself enough to be the one to ask the god awful question…
"Alex… where are we!"