A/N: I wanted to get this chapter up quick, so it may have spelling mistakes and what not. Please forgive me, just this once.
Once again, thanks for , there probably won't be an update for at least three days because I'm starting a second job so I'll be working 50+ hours a week and I'm writing Live Together, Die Alone as well.

Left Behind

Chapter 28

Knots

"Can you hear me?" A firm palm jostles his left shoulder and he takes a deep inhalation of stale, humid air.

"His name is Jack Shephard," Sawyer's familiar drawl enters Jack's empty mind as he tries to make sense of his surroundings, his eyes flutter, but his vision is still dark.

"Mr. Shephard—" the new male voice continues, but Sawyer quickly interrupts it.

"He's a doctor."

"James," the screechy aggravation in the new voice is evident, "I'm going to ask you to—"

His eyes open to blinding fluorescent lights encaged on the low ceiling; the sick olive walls reflect the glow in the small almost metallic room. He lies on an inexpensive cot diagonally with his injured shoulder touching the wall. A sparse changing curtain stands at his feet and the room is decorated with first aid supplies and fire safety equipment.

"Dr. Shephard?" The new voice belongs to a man in his late forties, he's balding and sporting a good deal of gray hair. His tired eyes hide behind thick lenses in thin-rimmed glasses and three prominent wrinkles line up on his forehead. He's wearing a pastel blue shirt underneath a customary lab coat.

"Jack." feeling his eyebrows contort as his examination of the room continues. When he turns his head to the right, he finds Sawyer sprawling out on a cot similar to the one he is on with clean white bandages wrapped around his shoulder and abdomen.

"Ray," the other man points to himself and offers a hand to shake. He takes it cautiously and watches as Ray makes a mark on his clipboard, "Do you have any idea where you are?"

"No," he admits with a head shake that sends a burning sensation up his shoulder. The same bandages Sawyer has lie across his own arm and he remembers being shot by Ben.

"We got off, Doc," Sawyer's voice is casual, like the strange room means nothing to him. He takes a bit of an apple and sends a smirk, "Just before the Others started shooting at us you blacked out."

"What about Kate?"

"Freckles threw a hissy fit and made sure I got you on the chopper. That's how I got shot twice," Sawyer extends his pinkie finger while still holding the apple to point to his bicep and just under his arm, "Looks like we'll have us some war stories to tell."

"How is she?"

"She usually spends all day down here, waiting for you to wake up," Sawyer takes a loud bite, then proceeds to finish telling the story with his mouth full, "But she has to go up every so often 'cause being below sea level makes her sick."

Scratching at the clipboard, Ray sends a glance over his glasses, "If you'd like to go see her, make sure you're sitting down. Retaining your balance on this ship is hard and from what James tells me you don't have good footing to begin with."

Sawyer shrugs at him with a smug smile, "You've been out cold for two days Doc. I had to talk trash to get you up."

The cot squeaks as he sits up. The metal legs begin to shiver as his weight shifts and the weak piece of fabric pulled tightly over the skeleton sinks. His bare recoil as they touch the linoleum floor which seems colder than it should be. Ray offers him a plain white t-shirt and the fabric feels so clean and light in his hands, "Have you been up yet?"

"Nah," Sawyer nods his head towards Ray, "Good ol' Ray here says I ain't supposed to get out of bed before we dock back in Hawaii tomorrow."

His heart beats faster and he wipes his sweat soaked palms against his bloodstained jeans, "We're almost to Hawaii?" That means less than a day before he's potentially separated from Kate and their child.

"ETA is three o'clock tomorrow," Sawyer takes a final bit and tosses the apple core across the room. It bounces off a wall and lands in a garbage can, "Figures it would take me getting shot twice in order to go to Hawaii"

He forces a laugh, that sounds strangled as he steps over the threshold. His feet hit a colder, metallic floor with deep grooves in it and on either end of the corridor, there are only slate walls to great him.

Ray catches his confused expression, "Oh, take a left and keep walking until you see the stairs."

"Thanks."

"She's fine Doc," Sawyer lifts his arm as Ray presses into the bandaged areas, "She'll be glad to see you."

Smiling, because he wants to see her, he turns left accompanied only but the clangs of his heavy footsteps. He wonders if she was afraid, Lapidus must've met them at the field, but then Sawyer got shot. He wonders if she's afraid now, because she knows better than anyone, what she did and where she's going to go once they get back. He wonders if she'll keep on running. He knows that some part of her wants to, even when they were on the island.

After a few feet of walking, he comes to a dimly light passage where twelve rusty stairs lead their way up to a door with a porthole beside it. His breathing is a little labored and his head a little light as it takes more exertion for him to climb the stairs than actually walk, but he propels himself upward with the handrail.

Through the porthole he sees the sun setting on a horizon filled with glass colored ocean and framed with white chipped railings. Towards the bow he sees her reclining on a lounger, one hand thrown over her stomach and the other one resting underneath the small of her back. He waits, memorizing every detail about this moment, because she looks beautiful and over the next few months, he may need something to hold onto.

His hand slides to the door and he turns the crank. The sound is screechy and accosting as the heavy door grinds against the floor. Tripping over the lip that holds the door into place, his feet slap onto the wet wooden deck of the giant ship

The sounds attract her attention and as she fidgets to try to sit upright once she recognizes him, but the movement isn't happening and the best thing she can do is hold out her arms for him to embrace her.

"Jack," her breath is hot against his shoulder as his hands find her waist. She smells like strawberries and the wind is blowing her damp hair in every direction. Moving away, he analyzes her. Her skin isn't so pallid and a few butterfly stitches hold together the cut on her face. She still appears fatigued, but the smile on her face is too wide to ignore, "Thank God you're okay."

"I'm fine, Kate," it's all he says as his thumb slides down her soft cheek and he savors the feel of her skin, "How are you? How's the baby?"

She laughs through her grin, eyes glistening with relief as her hand reassuringly stroke her stomach, "We're going to be a family."

Reaching forward, he tucks a strand of hair behind her ear and lets his hand linger on her face, "We were always a family."

She rocks forward pressing her lips into his and his hand moves underneath her hair, cradling her head because he doesn't want this to end. But she gasps against his lips, not in pleasure but pain and pulls away to hold her lower back.

"More contractions?" his posture drops and he leans over her, one hand on her stomach to feel the position of the baby and one underneath her to feel any obstructions.

"No," she arches her back away from the coolness of his hand, "Just a lot of bad backaches from sleeping in an actual bed."

One hand holds her bicep and the other her elbow as he helps her turn on her side, "You should try sleeping with a pillow between your legs."

"If it didn't work on the beach, why would it work now?"

Lifting her shirt to uncover her back, he lightly prods the muscles and frowns at the results, "All of your muscles are knotted," they're tight and hard as he presses his finger to her skin, "No wonder you're having backaches."

"Well this," she places a hand underneath her stomach and rolls back towards him, "Is the reason for that."

He has to laugh, because she wears her pale exposed stomach so awkwardly. A big protrusion that starts under her ribs, it slants downwards and jiggles when she moves. His hand replaces hers as he holds the bottom of her stomach like it might fall right off of her and he feels the baby start inside.

While keeping his hand still, he sits on the deck with his injured shoulder resting against the lounger. "Did Ray weigh you?"

"No," she laughs as her hand runs over his hair. The gesture is completely relaxing and he lets out a sigh, "I don't want to know how much I weigh. Do you?"

"I want you to have a healthy pregnancy weight," his hand starts to rub semi-circles below her belly button which is quickly becoming an outie. "Not gaining enough weight induces premature birth."

"So you think that's why I started to have contractions?"

Kate does deserve to know what Sawyer made so clear to him, that this baby may not be his. This is supported by the fact that her contractions stopped and her health increased tenfold since leaving the island. It makes him nervous and gives him a sinking feeling in his gut, not only to know that something he holds so dear might not be his. He can get over that, but the thought of someone taking the baby in an entirely legal way makes him nauseous. Though the only concrete biological relation to the baby is Kate, he can't bring himself to tell her what he knows.

"It seems like a good answer," he rests his head near her stomach watching it move with her breathes and wonders if the baby even knows him.


Next Chapter - Oh Boy, did someone say Hawaii and police? Oh, it was me...