A/n: So, you know how it goes. I keep saying I'm going to update consistently "from now on", and I keep completely forgetting to (bad author!). So because at this point there are only a few chapters left, I'm just gonna give 'er and put 'em all up at once so I can stop torturing you guys with absurdly long update times! Hobey ho, let's goooo.

Chapter 21

He could feel the gash was bad, but he couldn't quite see it. There was no way he would be stitching up himself after all. Just then, a woman with long, curly brown hair emerged from the bushes glancing around aimlessly.

"Excuse me!" he called. "Did you ever use a needle?"

"What?" the woman looked his way, still rubbing her wrists.

"Did you ever… patch a pair of jeans?" he gestured in the air the motion of sewing.

"I um… I made the drapes in my apartment?"

"That's fantastic, listen – if you have a second, I could use a little help here."

She came towards him until she was just a couple feet away. "With what?" she asked quietly.

Still kneeling, he turned his body slightly and lifted his arm so she could see the wound on his side and back.

"With this," he said. She shut her eyes briefly. "Look, I'd do it myself, I'm a doctor, but I just can't reach – "

"You want me to sew that up?"

"It's just the like drapes – "

"No," she protested, her voice quivering. "With the drapes I used a sewing machine!"

"No you can do this, I'm telling you." He paused and added, "If you wouldn't mind."

She looked very much like she either wanted to cry or hurry away, but after a moment, she nodded slightly, exhaling.

"Of course I will." she whispered.

"There was nothing else I could do," Addison sighed, leaning her head back in the break room chair. "We'd already given our statements to the police and it was obviously suicide."

Callie shook her head. "I can't believe it. Poor Jack. How was he when you left?"

Addison paused, searching for the right word before answering quietly, "Shattered."

After leaving Jack at his apartment, Addison had come straight to work and immediately explained the situation to the Chief. News outlets were likely already reporting Kate's death, so it wasn't going to be long before the whole hospital was aware of the tragedy. He was stunned and horrified, readily giving Jack as much time off as he needed.

"And you too, Addy," he'd said sadly. "I know how close you two are."

She'd thanked him and found Callie immediately, hauling her into a break room, shutting the doors, and closing the blinds before she proceeded to tell her what had happened. She'd skipped the part of sleeping with him (and admitting they loved each other), however – it had seemed selfish and trivial to discuss at this point, she'd thought, next to everything else that had happened.

"God…" Callie shook her head again.

"I've never felt so helpless in my entire life," Addison said emotionally, her eyes glistening. "I mean, I'm a doctor – we both are, but we… we were just too late. And he… he loved her. All I could do was stand there and watch him come apart."

"Addison," her friend leaned forward and placed a comforting hand on Addison's arm. "There's nothing you could have done."

"I know that, I do... But it doesn't make me feel better."

"No," Callie sighed. "I don't suppose it would."

Silence stretched for a few moments and the tears began streaming down Addison's face. When she spoke, her voice was thick and just above a whisper.

"I love him. And I don't know what to do now."

"You don't want to be a hero." His father regarded him seriously. "You don't want to try and save everyone. Because when you fail… you just don't have what it takes."

Jack felt like he was free falling in the pitch dark. He felt hollow and couldn't get the feeling of Kate's limp body out of his mind. He'd hated how cold she was, how she couldn't hold him back. He thought of the first time he'd tasted her lips in the jungle on the island, and of the last time, when she'd kissed him quick before going on the run.

He was drowning and he couldn't breathe or he was crashing against the rocks, pounded by the waves, over and over. He thought of the day, what felt like years and years ago now, when he had asked Addison if she ever felt like she was hanging by just a thread.

There was no thread anymore – just darkness.

"If you're thinking about going for the cockpit, I'm going with you." She said.

He turned to her, the firelight flickering across their features. "I don't know your name." He chuckled and she smiled softly.

"I'm Kate."

"Jack."

During the first week, Addison fielded questions about Jack and Kate at work and struggled to keep her mind focused on the task at hand. She used her lunch breaks to drive to Jack's apartment and make sure he hadn't choked on his own vomit.

She had trouble sleeping late at night, worrying about him, and would check on him before she left for her next shift. He was usually passed out on the bed or the couch, and more bottles had accumulated on the floor.

One night she invited Callie and Mark over for supper and handed them both a key to Jack's apartment so they could check on him when she was unable to. Addison trusted them wholly as her best friends, and knew they understood the severity of what Jack was going through. Mark hugged her tight, stroking her hair and promising it would all be ok. They pretended not to notice the wet spot on his shirt when she finally let go.

She settled beside him on the sand. "I want to tell you what I did. Why he was after me."

"I don't wanna know. It doesn't matter, Kate. Who we were, what we did before this, before the crash. Doesn't really… Three days ago, we all died." He paused. "We should all be able to start over."

In the second week following Kate's death, Addison packed an overnight bag and brought food to restock the fridge. Jack hadn't shaved or showered, hadn't even changed out of the suit from the night of the benefit. He was passed out on the couch with a half empty bottle of whiskey. She ordered take out and when he woke up, she coaxed him into having a few bites.

Afterwards, with red-rimmed eyes and without saying a word, Jack got up and went to the bedroom, shutting the door behind him. She sighed heavily and proceeded to clean up all the empty bottles and cans lying around before putting the leftovers away.

Several hours later, Addison had turned the couch into a temporary bed, and was reading with the lamp on. Jack emerged and stumbled into the living room.

She wanted to ask if he was ok, but she knew the answer. She could see he was anything but ok.

Jack collapsed into the chair across from her and met her gaze properly for the first time in days.

"I couldn't save her," he said miserably. "I could never… save her. When I found out she was a criminal on the island, I told her it was time for a fresh start. And when she fell in love with Sawyer, and she… broke my heart… all I ever did was try to save her."

He shook his head and buried his face in his hands.

"I failed. I couldn't save her then… and I couldn't save her now."

"Maybe she couldn't be saved."

He lifted his head. "When she showed up at the house that night? The night she escaped and disappeared? I should have done something. None of this would have happened."

"Like what?" she asked softly. "What could you have done?"

He didn't have an answer. That didn't stop the guilt from gnawing relentlessly at his insides. And it didn't stop him from replaying that voicemail over and over again.

He finally found her, out in the jungle just sitting there.

"Kate, what the hell are you doing out here?"

She turned slightly, almost surprised to see him, and he continued approaching until he stood before her.

"What happened in the hatch? Why'd you leave?" He paused and when she didn't answer, he continued. "I come back, I find Sawyer just lying in the ground. You just took off – "

"Is he ok?"

"Yes, Kate," he snapped. "He's fine."

She slowly got up off the log and began walking away. "I'm sorry."

"Are you?"

She stopped and faced him, and her voice became suddenly emotional and defensive. "Ya, I'm sorry. I am sorry I'm not as perfect as you. I'm sorry that I'm not as good!"

He put his hands up. "Okay… what's going on with you?"

"Just forget it." She replied in a small voice and started away from him again.

He wasn't about to let her get off that easy, so he reached out and snatched her wrist.

"No, don't walk away from me, no – "

"Don't!" She tried to yank away from him but he pulled her close, confused and scared by her reaction.

"Kate, Kate!" He pulled her into an embrace and she struggled for a moment, crying.

"Don't, stop it…"

"It's ok, it's ok…" He held her close and she cried into his shoulder.

"Jack," she breathed and moved back slightly, no longer fighting him, her face tear-stained. "This place – this place is crazy! It's just… I can't – it's driving me nuts." She cried.

"I know… it's ok." He gently took hold of her shoulders, breathing as heavy as she was. "It's alright. It's alright."

Her hazel eyes were wide and vulnerable as she stared at him and he straightened a little, feeling she was calmer. Then without warning, she leaned forward and cupped his face with her hands, kissing him hard.

Jack didn't sleep any more, not really. He mostly just kept drinking until he couldn't remember if he was asleep or awake. Then when he became more aware of his surroundings, of the reality he was faced with, he'd find a new bottle and keep going.

He had loved Kate for a relatively short amount of time, but it felt like a lifetime. He knew her, knew so much about her, and had loved her, even her flaws and her problems. He felt like he'd been loving her so long, holding on to her memory so tight, that it had become almost an obligation or habit. Something he did without really thinking it, without meaning it anymore. It used to mean something – she used to mean everything – but ever since she'd left…

And then she'd turned up dead, in his apartment, with the ring he'd intended for her once upon a time on her finger. The guilt had been crushing – the first night he spent intimately with Addison, the night he admitted aloud not only to himself but to her as well that he loved her, was the night when Kate needed him. After so many months of waiting in vain for her to come back to him, the moment he finally let her go, it came back to cripple him.

What was worse – so much worse – was that the overwhelming emotion he'd experienced, when he'd held Kate's cold body close and knew she was gone, had been relief. He'd shut his eyes and indescribable, immense relief had washed over him, which only caused the guilt to increase tenfold to take its place. How could he feel relieved at her death? A little voice had whispered, however: it's over. It's finally over.

That relief haunted him, as did his tremendous feelings of failure. There had to have been something he could have, should have done. Something the night of the benefit so that he arrived home in time to stop her, something before that night, something months ago, something back on the island. Jack replayed everything in his mind constantly, trying to find where he went wrong and finding hundreds of different avenues he could have or should have taken, and maybe this tragedy would have been avoided.

All he could dwell on was the what ifs and could have beens, and the guilt clawed and ripped at his heart. He was raw and destroyed, and convinced it was somehow his fault, that somehow he could have prevented it.

Jack listened to Kate's voicemail again and pressed the latest bottle of alcohol to his lips. He was passed out before he heard Addison come home from work that day.

A/n: I'll say this: it's always darkest before the dawn... Thanks for reading!