Chapter 17
Of all the things that John had told them about his time on the island, this may have been the most pleasant shock yet. "So that's why Rose and Bernard stayed behind," Hurley said first.
"I think I realized what everybody who'd been running the island had been doing wrong all this time," Locke said sincerely. "They always tried to go it alone. I got the feeling that Jacob's mother had been guarding the island alone. Maybe if she'd told the two children that she'd been raising as sons, 'you'll have to guard the island together,' none of this violence would've happened. They wouldn't have spent thousands of years trying to kill each other or drag God knows how many people into an endless war."
"And as long Bernard and Rose were together, they would never be alone," Jack shook his head. "I'm just surprised that you finally listened to me."
"I think now that the island is finally behind us, we can accept that if the two of us had respected each other or even trusted each other, most of what happened wouldn't have happened," Locke admitted. "I was right about the island, but you were right about being part of a community."
"And Rose was right about all of it," Jack told them. "I should've trusted her more when she said her husband was still alive."
"Hell, I don't think I'd have bought it til I met the man on the other side of the island," James admitted.
"In all candor, for all his efforts at trying to pick out the right people, I don't think Jacob fully understood what it meant to take on the guardianship of the island," Locke said truthfully. "He was always looking for someone to do it. He kept putting the good of the island above the community or even the individual. We were always stronger as a group than we ever were on our own. "
He looked at Sun and Jin. "I never asked him which one of you was the candidate. But maybe under other circumstances, the two of you could've raised Ji Yeon there."
"You know what Juliet told me about pregnant women," Sun reminded him.
"By the way, while you were quizzing the God of the island, did he ever give you an explanation of what exactly happened so that no woman could give birth on the island?" Juliet demanded.
"It wasn't anything he did," Locke told them. "As long as Richard was on the island, there were fifteen babies born on the island. All of them lived passed infancy, and most of them lived a perfectly normal life. It is his belief that when Dharma came to the island, while they were performing their experiments, they did something to poison the life force of the island."
"You mean the incident," Sayid said.
"That was just one of many experiments that they performed that might've disturbed the natural order of things. His words, not mine." Locke said. "According to him, the last time a child came to term on the island was when the two of his people had a son in 1987." He paused. "His name was Karl."
James jumped at that one. "You mean the kid you were keeping in the cage next to me," he told Juliet. "Why the hell was Ben doing that to one of his own people in the first place?"
"Karl and Alex were starting a relationship," Juliet said softly. 'He was afraid Alex would get pregnant."
James shook his head. "Couldn't that guy just have gotten some Trojans on one of his trips off the island?" he whispered to himself.
"So the Dharma people ruined the island for pregnant women," Juliet was more interested in this part of it.
"Perhaps. And in a larger sense, maybe getting rid of them didn't help," Locke admitted. "There was never a successful pregnancy after the Purge. Jacob was very clear on that."
"Maybe he shouldn't have ordered it," Jack told them.
"He didn't. That was a decision that Widmore did pretty much on his own." Locke told them. "Richard acted in concordance with him, but Jacob had not wanted a battle for the island. He said that bloodshed was never what he was about.' He held up his hand. "Jacob had a sanctimonious streak about him. Guess it comes with being immortal."
"So what you're saying is that the problem with the island was never scientific, so much as it was spiritual," Juliet said. "I'm not sure whether that makes me feel better or worse."
"Just consider yourself lucky to be off the island," James slipped his arm around Juliet.
Kate looked at John. "You basically said that you didn't think any one person could've done the job," she said, returning to the previous subject. "If Rose and Bernard had turned you down, who would you have asked to take their place?"
"Danielle and Alex," Locke said quietly. "There would've been a logic to it. Everything that happened on this island was because of a bad relationship between a mother and her children. All Danielle wanted was to be with her daughter again. She'd already said she had no intention of leaving the island. She could've finally had what she always wanted. To have a family."
"What happened to Danielle?" Sayid asked.
"When I last saw her and Alex, they were happy," Locke told him. "And you know that they both experienced very little of it on the island. Rose and Bernard more than understood that they'll be safe."
"I was shocked when she told me that she had no intention of leaving the island," Jack admitted. "I thought after sixteen years she'd just want to go home. I never did understand how anyone could've seen that place as a home."
"I think even among the natives, there was always a fifty/fifty split as to that," Locke told them. "The larger point I was trying to make was that no single one of you could've lived as the next Jacob. Jin and Sun might've been able to raise their daughter there, but I don't think you would've been the kind of parents to tell them there was nothing across the sea."
"I liked the fishing on the island," Jin told them. "And I would've been happy with Sun. But I wanted us to be together off the island."
Sun nodded. "Did Jacob ever resolve what happened on the island? Can women carry children to term?"
"The man was always maddeningly vague," Locke admitted. "Rose actually asked the question herself before she took over. All Jacob would say was: 'The island is whole now'. I can't even begin to explain what that means. And honestly, I was focused on other things at the time."
"Like getting off the island," Hurley said. "Speaking of which, how exactly did you do that?"
"After I left Rose and Bernard to go through whatever ceremony Jacob did to pass on the leadership – "
"All that trouble getting there, and you weren't even interested to see whatever decoder ring Jacob was gonna pass on?" James asked incredulously.
"I'd made my decision," Locke said simply. "Whatever advice and procedures Jacob intended to pass on weren't mine to follow. Besides, I was still leader of the Others right then. And I had to give some orders that were, to use a phrase you'd be comfortable with, would make the natives particularly restless."
WHOOOSH
THE TEMPLE
Richard and Dogen were waiting at the front gate when Locke returned the next night.
"What did he have to say?" Richard asked.
"He explained what my purpose was, why we're here, and what my journey has been about," Locke said slowly. "I would tell you what it was, Richard, but the fact is, in a few hours, there are going to be some major changes on this island. And right now, I believe it is my job to deliver the message before your new leaders come here."
Richard in particular looked a little uneasy when he heard this. "Why are we here?" he said slowly. "Can you tell me that much?"
"All the people who have been brought here were to be considered to be the guardian of this island," Locke told them. "That's what the lists were for. And if Jacob had just been willing to tell us that the first week we were on this island, a lot fewer people would've died. Keep that in mind when you're deciding to follow orders next time."
Richard definitely winced when Locke mentioned that last phrase.
"I realize that I'm the last person to lecture when it comes to following orders blindly," Locke said, louder so that the rest of his people could hear him. "But you really need to understand. I am very disappointed. In all of you. I don't know why all of you came to this island. Out of a greater purpose, I have no doubt. But to believe in the purpose over everything and everyone else, that negates everything we try to do."
"Coming from you, that sounds a bit hypocritical," Lennon said.
"We're all hypocrites. Even Jacob." The reaction was obvious. 'That may sound like blasphemy, but even he'd admit it was the truth. He may have been a great man, but the emphasis should've been on man rather than great."
"You said you had a message," Dogen was speaking in English.
"There are going to be some big changes on this island very soon," Locke said simply. "Jacob is no longer going to be in charge. Some of his rules will apply. Some of them will not. The most prominent of them is this. Anyone who comes to this island now will come of their own free will. They want to go home, you let them go home. They want to stay, you let them stay. And you tell them why this place is special and why they are here. None of this 'us or them' mumbo-jumbo. Anyone who comes here is a person of the island. No higher, no lower."
There actually seemed to be some nodding and this, though some of the elders – Richard and Dogen in particular – looked a little unsure.
Locke walked over to Richard. "A long time ago, when you first came to this island, you asked Jacob for something. I understand your reasoning for it at the time. So he has a message that you need to hear." He took him by the hand. "You've done your penance."
Richard had been stoic almost the entire time John had known him, but when he heard those four words, he blinked several times. "Does that mean…?"
Locke nodded. "You've done far more than anyone should ever have to do for this island," he said gently. "You will see your wife again. "
Richard turned around, and he was pretty sure that he didn't want anybody to see him weep.
Dogen looked a little more hopeful at this. "You've served the Temple well for a very long enough," Locke said softly. "Jacob knew that he was asking a lot of you when you took this job on. Maybe more than you thought that you had to give." Locke walked over to him. "Your son misses you a great deal. You can go home to him now."
Dogen didn't start crying, but John had known him well enough to see that he too, was profoundly moved by hearing this.
He turned around. "Many of you have served this island for years, to leaders good and flawed. You've all made commitments to this place. All of you have stayed loyal to this island with one rule in place: once here, you can never leave." Locke looked at them. "As of tonight, that rule will no longer be enforced. The rules that he makes for people who come here now apply to you as well. If you wish to stay, you may stay. If you want to leave – even for a brief while – you can do that to."
Now they all looked a little confused. Lennon spoke up. "But leaving the island has always been dangerous, much less returning to it."
"Besides, even with the sub, we don't know how to get our instruments working again," Richard said quietly.
Locke put his hands on his hips. "I find it hard to believe that Ben didn't bother to recruit a group of technical people. You've been manning the Dharma stations ever since the Purge. I know that there are some of you who still know how to work them."
There were a few moments of silence. Then slowly, a couple of hands began to go up.
Locke nodded. "I thought so. The last thing my friends did before they left the island was stop jamming the signals leaving it. How much more effort would it take to get them to work on a larger scale?"
Aldo, who had a certain background in science, raised his hand. "A month, maybe six weeks."
"And connecting the sonar with the submarine back to civilization?"
"A little longer, maybe two months."
"Then as soon as it light, we start working on it. Anyone who knows something about how to work it goes to work." Locke said quietly. "It won't be easy, but now you'll understand just how so many of my people felt when they were trying to leave the island."
There was a clear emphasis on the word my that nobody could've missed. Certainly not Richard. "Does that mean you'll be leaving too, John?"
Locke didn't even pause. "I don't think I ever fully understood my place in the world until very recently. I thought this island was my destiny. And maybe it was. But maybe destiny is never as permanent a word as I thought it was. This island was my destiny… for awhile. It was my job to guide it and its people to the right path. And now that I have, I can find something I really didn't. Not even here."
"What's that?" one of the Others asked.
"Peace." Dogen said.
WHOOOSH
"I'm guessing they were able to fix everything," Jack said quietly.
Locke nodded. "Ben had always been careful when it came to protecting certain of his people. With the exception of Mikhail, the tech people he recruited over the years did not go to the beach that night. And with the exception of Harper, they all survived Widmore's assault."
"How long did it take to get everything working?" Kate asked.
"About a month. Turns out the desire to go home is one of the most powerful motivators of all." Locke looked at them all, finally fixing his glance on Juliet. "But I'm guessing you all know that by now."
No one could argue with that. "When did you leave?" Sayid asked.
"It was December 1st," Locke said. "We could've left a little sooner, but I held up a few days because there was something that Rose and Bernard wanted to do before everybody left."
"What was that?" Hurley asked.
"The one thing that we never did on the island," Locke said. "And for all I know, maybe it was the first time it happened in the island's entire history."
WHOOOSH
November 28, 2005
Rose and Bernard had formally been in charge ever since Locke had given his orders in the Temple. No one had seen Jacob since then. Rose had said that after he had finished the ceremony – she refused to go into more detail and Locke had not pressed her, Jacob had said that he was going to be gone for awhile. Whether that meant he was going to leave the island or walk into the ocean until he could walk no further, Rose didn't know.
"The man has watched this island for more than two thousand years," she had told John. "He's entitled to his peace."
"And what are you going to do about him?" Locke asked.
Bernard answered this time. "We have some ideas. But he's entitled to peace too."
Locke was so relieved that he didn't have to think about just how difficult could be anymore. For all the work he had done for the island, he couldn't believe how glad he was to no longer have it be his problem.
For the next few weeks, he had split his time between helping where he could with the sub and the communications equipment, helping Rose and Bernard acclimate into their new 'job', and just exploring the island. For some reason it seemed even more precious now, knowing that he was about to leave it forever. Maybe it was the fact that the island was no longer the most important thing to him anymore.
Then, just before all the work was about to be done, Rose and Bernard asked Locke if he knew what day it was.
"It's the day before Thanksgiving," Bernard told them. "I always remember that because it's generally a week after Rose's birthday."
Locke shook his head. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."
"What, you would've gotten be something from Neiman Marcus?" Rose joshed. "It's alright. Richard mentioned to me that after all this time, he barely remembers what his birthday is anymore."
"And that doesn't scare you?"
"What was scarier is the possibility that the next birthday you have might be your last," Rose said without any regret. "I told Bernard I'd made my peace with it before our honeymoon, and I thought I had after all the chemo and radiation, but it was a frightening thought."
"And the alternative doesn't worry you," Locke couldn't help but ask.
"Not as long as I have someone who'll always remember it," Rose looked towards her husband. "You will remember it next year, right?"
"Every year with you was always a gift," Bernard said. "Now it'll be even more special."
Locke found himself wiping away a tear. He wanted that for himself someday. "You were saying something about Thanksgiving."
"Richard said before that time doesn't matter the same way on the island that is does in other places," Rose said in that matter-of-fact way of hers. "But time should matter. This island should be apart from the world, that's true. But the people here should always remember where they came from. Somehow, I don't think of the Others ever did that."
Locke wondered if he'd done something to influence that. In that long conversation he'd had with Ben before he gone to 'blow up the sub', he'd told him that he and his people were hypocrites for living on the island and yet sleeping in beds and having refrigerators. The next day they'd moved out of the Barracks and back into the jungle.
Now he wondered if maybe Ben hadn't had the right idea. He'd lived on the island for more than thirty years, but most of his people hadn't. They'd gotten used to having some of the accoutrements of civilization nearby, and some of them may never have considered the island 'home', but that didn't mean they didn't think it was any less precious. They were trying to remember where they came from. And for Locke, who had spent every single moment of his life regretting his past, that had been anathema. Maybe he'd been wrong about that.
"What were you thinking about?" Bernard asked.
"Whether Ben was right about some things," John admitted.
"Well, you know what they say about a broken clock," Rose said with a just a trace of humor. Once again, John knew that he'd made the right choice. The woman found forgiveness for the man who tried to kill her husband. "Anyway, there are going to be a lot changes on the island very soon, and I thought the best way to tell everybody how things were going to be was with a celebration. The pallet drop was a week ago, so I figured it might not be the worst idea to have ourselves a little feast."
"And then, when everybody's drunk on Dharma Merlot, tell them about your new plans going forward," John surmised.
"You know what they say about catching more flies with honey than with vinegar," Rose said sweetly.
"They might not know that saying," Locke said, only half in jest. "Under Ben's leadership, I think the only choices they had been between vinegar and cyanide."
"All the more reason to make it clear how different things are going to be," Bernard pointed out. "Also, I asked around. None of these people can remember if there ever was something resembling a celebration on this island."
"Well, if Richard can't remember it, then it never happened," Locke said firmly. "And honestly, that is sad. All the great things about this island, they never seem to have any fun on it. I can understand why we never had any fun, but no one here?"
"The Dharma folk may have some fun," Rose said thoughtfully.
"Maybe that's why they killed them," Bernard replied, only half in jest.
"That's going to be one of my declarations going forward," Rose said sincerely. "Everything on this island can't be all about protecting. You have to have fun occasionally. Otherwise, what's the point of life…anywhere?"
"Well, then you've already proven you're smarter than me," John admitted. "Cause that idea never even occurred to me."
"We already knew I was smarter than you, dear," Rose said gently.
"When are you going to have it?"
"Tomorrow night. Give everybody a chance to prepare. I hope you don't mind but we're going to use the Barracks for it." Over the last few weeks, Rose had supervised the cleaning up of the Others former living quarters. She had said quite simply that living in the jungle was perfectly nice but 'sometimes a body just wants to sleep on a bed." No one was really going to put up an argument, and Locke raised no objections.
"Are you going to have any grand pronouncements?" Locke asked curiously.
"We're still working on a way to negotiate with the Man in Black." Bernard said quietly. "We've reached out to him a couple of times, but he hasn't let himself be seen since your conversation with him."
"In any form?"
Rose shook her head. "Not even as the pillar of smoke. I think he may be as perplexed by the changes as everyone else on the island."
"That may actually be a good thing," Locke said. "If he's thinking, that means he's not killing people."
"There's got to be another answer to that," Bernard said. "Some middle ground that we have yet to find."
"Don't be discouraged. Jacob couldn't find one in two thousand years. No one expects you to have all the answers in a month."
"I know," Rose said simply. "I just think that there has to be some kind of solution for this wasted life."
"You'll come up with something," Locke said. "I have faith."
"You always did, John," Rose reminded him.
John shook his head. "In the two of you."
LLLLL
The people on the island were not so much suspicious as they were surprised by their new leaders' plan for the next night. John, however, chose to look upon this as a good thing. He'd rarely seen the Others surprised by anything during the year he'd spent among them, and when they were, they were angry about it. Nobody seemed to really be worried about what would happen from a simple celebratory supper.
Rose and Bernard knew that even though they were supernatural beings, they had no intention of changing their behavior because of it. They asked several of their people to help them the cook for this feast, mainly because neither had cooked for over a hundred people – ever, and as Bernard put it 'we might be Gods, but we're still not the iron chef." John had a suspicion that this was not only to bring everybody together, but for the two of them to get to know the rest of the Others as people, something Jacob had never even considered doing.
The preparation of the meal took the better part of the next day. Rose actually said she'd hoped it would – "makes me feel a little like the parade should be playing in the background." It wasn't a traditional Thanksgiving by any means – there was no turkey in the pallet drop – but Locke had no problem helping with the gathering of food. He caught two boars and helped supervising the catching of several fish for the meal. Considering that just about everything else in the Dharma containers was practically a side dish already, they had everything they needed for the food.
Locke had invited Danielle to the feast, and was shocked but not that surprised to know that Karl and Alex had no idea what Thanksgiving even was. In a sense, he frowned a little on Ben's abilities as a leader and as a parent that he never taught the girl he'd raised as his daughter about holidays. But then, he'd stolen her from her mother when she was an infant, so the bar was pretty low already.
Even after everything that had happened, Rousseau had still been reluctant to come to the Barracks. Locke remembered how she fled when he, Kate and Sayid's 'rescue mission' had led them there. Even with Ben gone, Danielle's old fears of the place still ran deep.
"How are you doing, Danielle?" Locke asked. "There have been a lot of changes for you in the past year."
"All of them pleasant." Locke realized that until her daughter had been returned, he'd never once seen the woman smile.
"The kinds of scars that this place left on you; I can't imagine they'd healed that quickly." Locke said.
"Perhaps not normally," Danielle looked at John. "You always said this place had miraculous qualities. Maybe it just took some time for me to realize all of them."
Locke would've thought that were true, had the island not caused so many of them in the first place. But that had been under the old regime. Maybe things were better now.
"That still doesn't mean the memories and the fears don't linger," Danielle admitted. "Some part of me still doesn't want to accept that things might have changed for the better."
Locke didn't answer directly; just cast his eyes towards Alex.
"I'll be honest. Even now, it's still hard to be with people."
"You were alone for sixteen years, Danielle." Locke reminded her. "No one expected it to change overnight. Even Sayid was never sure, and he trusted you the most."
"It's taken work." She had cleaned up a lot in the past few months. John didn't think Danielle had ever cared about her appearance for a very long time. Perhaps she wanted to look better for her daughter. If she'd known just how much effort her daughter's people had put into not looking clean and orderly, maybe she wouldn't have felt so much pressure. But that was definitely not something he was going to tell her.
"Though I'll admit, I'm curious to see where my daughter called home for so long," Danielle said.
"It was just where I lived," Alex said firmly. "It was never really my home."
That remark would've probably caused a huge amount of pain for Ben. That said, Locke still thought it was true. Everything he'd seen about Alex and all of her actions involving Claire and everybody who'd been held at Hydra Island would seem to mean that Alex had never really been an Other.
"Couldn't have been that terrible," Karl said sadly.
"It stopped being my home when Ben decided that he needed to control my life like he ruled his people," Alex said firmly. She looked at Locke. "If it counts for anything, John, you did a much better job leading than he ever did."
"All due respect, your father didn't exactly set the bar that high," Locke said with a trace of humor. "None of his former people seem to miss him that much either."
"Well, they're going to miss you," Alex said quietly. "You sure you want to leave?"
"It's taken me awhile to this decision, Alex," Locke said firmly. "These aren't my people either. And it was never my destiny to lead her. Just to be a placeholder for the right people to take over. This is the best opportunity I'll have to say goodbye."
LLLLL
"I'm glad everybody is here," Rose said, after most of the food had been consumed. "Because I thought now would be a good time for me and my husband to explain what's going to happen from this point forward. Hopefully, we will alleviate much of your concerns."
The convivial noise and chatter that had filled most of the meal hushed almost immediately.
"We know this island is a special place," Bernard said slowly. "Some of us have always known that. For some of us, it's taken longer to reach the same conclusion. And perhaps the reason some of us have come to doubt it is because well, we don't want to name names, but your methods of protecting it, leave much to be desired."
"I don't know whose idea it was to treat anybody who came to this island like an invading force," Rose looked around, "even if their airplane blew apart while they were flying over it, but from now, you treat visitors like they were visitors."
"Tom liked the stage makeup," one of them spoke up. "Thought it was suspicious to look neat and polished."
Bernard raised an eyebrow. He had a very good reason to be hostile towards anything Tom would do. "Was it his idea to stick guns in our faces? Kidnap children?"
"Now, now honey," Rose put her hand on Bernard's shoulder. "That was under the previous management. Now they're going to look in the suggestion box." She turned to them. "Doesn't matter if their boat washes up on shore or if they crash on to this place. I got a feeling you got the nickname 'Hostiles' from one of the previous occupiers for a reason. To quote a great sage from my part of the world, next time, try a little tenderness."
They all took this in.
"While were on the subject, there will be no more lists from this point forward." Bernard said firmly. "You will treat everybody on this island the way you would want to be treated. Because as of this moment, we are not going to bring anyone to the island. If they come here, they will be welcomed. You will feed them, clothe them, and maybe even show them the computers you've got around. And you're going to first assume that they want to go home rather than stay on a deserted island in the Pacific. Oh, and they might want to tell the people who think they're lost at sea or crashed in a hot air balloon that they're not dead. Some of them might have family who miss them."
The natives of the island suddenly were all looking at the sand as if it were the most interesting thing in the world they'd ever seen.
"The previous leadership seemed to believe that the island chose for everybody who came here to be here." Rose looked at them. "We intend to alter that way of thinking. From now on, anyone who stays here will choose the island. And you'll know that because you'll ask them."
"This place is special. Everyone who is here right now knows that." Bernard told them. "But you might want to explain some of the minor details about this place to people who are on it. Who these designed these monuments that would not be unfamiliar on an obelisk. Where did these barracks come from and what happened to them. How did you happen to find out about this place? They may not be fun questions to answer, but trust me when I tell you; the people who arrive on this island might consider it need-to-know."
John had never seen so many people lo0king this uncomfortable in their lives. And his fellow survivors had done a lot of shaming in the two months he'd been with them.
"We don't mean this as personal condemnation," Rose said in a more gentle tone. "My husband and I know you've been getting some decidedly mixed messages from up the chain, when you got them at all. But 'just following orders' has never been the best excuse for anything, and certainly not here."
"From now on, the buck stops here," Bernard said sincerely. "You have a question about anything, you come to us first. And we're not going to be living apart from you, like Jacob did. We're going to be living here with you."
"Though it would be nice if we got a place with running water," Rose said lightly.
No one raised an objection or an argument. If anything, most of the people on the island actually looked grateful that they wouldn't have to be following orders blindly based on some command from a deity that they'd never met. Locke knew that if someone had just made this speech to them when they'd all come to the island, a lot of lives would've been spared.
"I know many of you still have questions," Rose told them. 'And when we can answer them, we will. But for now, I think we've had more than enough serious talk. It is time for some music."
And then, at least for Locke, one of the biggest surprises of the night happened. Rose began to sing in one of the most beautiful mezzo voices he'd ever heard. He was pretty sure that most of the others were astonishing to.
Though maybe it was simply because some of them never heard 'The Greatest Love' before.
WHOOOSH
Juliet was smiling a little. 'I guess Rose must've found my CD collection."
"Not necessarily," Kate was smiling too. "Her husband is pretty musical herself. That is where you got the 'mix tape', right?" She winked at James, who actually blushed a little.
"As far as I know, Rose always had a good musical ear," Claire said fondly. "Couple of times she actually sang Aaron to sleep and you wouldn't necessarily think gospel would make for great lullabies. But she could pull it off."
Jack looked at Locke. "There any chance will ever see them again? You know, without having to crash over the island."
"Like I said, when they took over maintaining the island, Rose and Bernard changed the rules," Locke said sincerely. "Anyone can come and go from the island as they pleased. As far as I know, that pertained to them as well as everyone else. How exactly they would do it I never quite understood, but they made it very clear that they might see us again someday."
"But you don't think that's going to happen," James had clearly picked up on that the rest of them hadn't.
"I don't think it's going to happen anytime soon," Locke picked his words carefully. "Rose and Bernard wanted to make sure they could get the island running under their leadership, and they recognized that it was probably going to take some work. Considering that they time doesn't mean the same thing to them anymore than it does to us, I don't necessarily think they'll show up for, say, Aaron's third birthday or Jack and Kate's anniversary. If for no other reason then they thought, and I quote both of them 'that's a little too close to how the last guy ran the place, and you know how badly he mucked that up.'"
James raised an eyebrow. "'Mucked it up?"
"Rose and Bernard didn't have your mouth, James," Kate reminded him.
"Anyway, the day after that, I said my private goodbyes to Rose and Bernard, and joined the group who were leaving the island. I made damn sure that Zach and Emma were on that sub before I got on it."
"Did anyone ever give a reason why they were taken in the first place?" Hurley demanded.
"There hadn't been children on the island in a very long time," Juliet said sadly. "It was all Ben's doing. I never did figure out how they managed to turn them so quickly."
Jack looked at Locke. "You're leaving one part out, aren't you?"
"One last errand I did. Rose and Bernard did work out an arrangement with Jacob. Something that would solve all their problems. Something that wouldn't occur to Jacob at all."
WHOOOSH
Locke walked up to the dock. "You know, for someone who's wanted this since practically the day he was born, you'd think he'd be more interested in leaving."
"I'm just not used to walking on solid ground," the man who had been the smoke monster once said. "I'd think you of all people could appreciate that, John."
John nodded as they walked up to the area the Dharma Initiative had once known as Pala Ferry.
"Once we get to land, you'll have to get to a bank," Locke said. "You do understand how those things work, right?"
"I'm still figuring out how this host thing works, but yeah that's something he was very familiar with."
"According to Richard, these are the accounts that Ben had access to," Locke handed him the bank book and passport that he had spent the last day on the island altering.
"So Dean Moriarty is going to be my name going forward?"
"It's going to be a safer one than Martin Keamy," Locke pointed out.
'Martin' took the folder. "This last maneuver, was it Jacob's idea or Rose's?"
"You wanted to leave the island. I don't think you can afford to be picky as to how."
'Martin' shook his head. "I just wonder it was a dig that the body I'm going to inhabit is probably the most cruel and bloodthirsty of all the people that came to this island."
"Well, he was sent here by a vicious monster, and you're taking on the alias of a man who committed nearly as many horrendous crimes as you did," Locke admitted. "Ironies abound, that's for sure. But there is another way to look at it."
"What's that?"
"Keamy has a lot to atone for. So do you. In a way, this is your best chance to make a clean start. Just live up to your side of the arrangement."
"Believe me, John. Once I'm free of this island, I have no intention of having anything to do with anybody associated with it. And that includes your friends."
Locke nodded.
"I don't understand why you're doing all this, John." The Man in Black said. "After everything I put you and everybody else on this island through all these months – hell, all these years – and you're just going to let me leave?"
"Two days after the plane crash, Jack told Kate that it didn't matter what we were before. Everybody got a clean slate now. And while I'm not a hundred percent sure he ever believed it, I think you're entitled to nothing less."
"So you're listening to Jack now?" 'Keamy' raised an eyebrow.
"That's why I'm leaving the island, isn't it?" Locke said calmly.
"And to be honest, I never thought you would," 'Keamy' said.
They reached the opening. "After you," Locke said.
Keamy looked around. "Do convicts feel this way after serving a life sentence?"
"Don't think of it as a sentence. Think of it as an end of one phase, and the beginning of the next."
Keamy looked around several more times, and then began to climb down the ladder.
Locke took a longer look around. It was a great place, this island. It had been a sanctuary, the place of his reawakening and rebirth. It had been his salvation. But it had never been his home. And now, it was time to go back to the real one. To see if he could rebuild everything.
He was reminded of the last thing Desmond had said to him before he had gone down to 'blow the dam', where he had made the biggest mistake of his life. Now, he thought that a slight alteration to it would be fitting.
"If I'm blessed, maybe one day I'll see you in another life," he said.
