(A/N: Hey all, it's my summer break, here in Ohio, and have I got a story for you. Quite odd how the idea came up for it, really. My grandmum was talking about how I should volunteer at the Rec Center more often, and whatnot, and all the sudden, it just hit me, right smack dab in the mind. I literally had to run away from my grandmum, and write the grand idea down before I lost it. What's really funny is that it has absolutely nothing to do with volunteering whatsoever. Yes, I will still continue Searching, but it's taking me a bit of time to write it, and this is just a filler story to pass the time. So, please, just bear with me on this. Any comments appreciated, and criticism is allowed. :) )

Disclaimer: Don't own Lost. And the title of this chapter is a Coldplay song title! And I was listening to Coldplay's "X and Y" album, and "A Rush of Blood To The Head" album when I started off this fic. I heart Coldplay. And Lost!

Thanks: To my mum, for if she hadn't helped me out; this would all be lost to me. And for ff-dot-net, because they let me post on here. :) And to my grandmum, for if she hadn't been talking about volunteering, I would of never zoned out and thought to write down the idea.


-Conversation-

-Chapter 1-

-The Speed Of Sound-


"I just don't think Kate should be by herself all the time, John!" Jack sighed exasperatedly. This debate with Locke was getting old pretty fast.

"She can fend for herself." Locke stated simply.

"But nobody knows where she is half the time!" He shot back.

"Why do you care?" Locke asked the question all the survivors had been wondering.

"…Because." Jack said, not giving away anymore.

Kate had heard bits and pieces of this conversation, her name woven in and out of the intricate craftwork many times. She knew that Jack hadn't meant for her to hear this, and she doubted he even knew that she was poised behind him. She was going to surprise him, but now, she wanted to know why he was so interested in her safety. Tuning back in, she heard another part of it.

"But she was traipsing through the forest with a backpack full of dynamite on her back! She shouldn't be doing that! No woman should." Jack's voice cut through the air, "I just don't understand that when there's a dangerous situation, she's always the first to sign up for it. Always."

"But that's okay, Jack. She's a free woman, and she can do what she wants to." Locke replied, his voice cracking full of reassurance.

"I don't know, Locke. I mean, it's almost like she wants to die, like it's the consequence for whatever she did in the real world. But why on earth would she want to face it?" Jack sighed. He cared so much about her, but he didn't understand her half the time either.


Kate had heard enough, and she quietly snuck away in anger, trying not to explode within hearing distance of anyone. All she wanted to do was help, and Jack considered her to be a nuisance. She thought he had really liked her, but he was just like everyone else, talking to her just out of pity.

A wall of realization hit her as she thought about past conversations she had with him. Kate was almost always the first to approach him, the first to speak, and most of the words they shared were about how she should stay back and help out Claire or pick fruit.

Kate could only think that Jack was a sexist, that he expected a man should do the hard, complicated things, and leave the women to pick up the mess that came after the men saved the world. And she wouldn't put up with it. Her father had been one, never letting Kate's mother show any sign of intelligence, only patching up worn jeans and cooking dinner.

But to him, Kate had been different.

Out of the whole family, he had always picked her to go hunting with him, or spend a day out on the lake. Maybe it was because he had wanted Kate to be a boy so bad, that he treated her like one. To her mother, her name was always Katie. To him, it was always Kate, and in a way she knew how he felt.


"She'll be fine. If anyone can fight the island and all it's predators, it's Kate." Locke replied. "Believe me, I promise."

"I just don't want to see her get hurt anymore then she has to, Locke." He voiced.

"I know, Jack. I know…" Locke exhaled. "But you aren't giving her any credit. You've seen how she's acted in situations, I've seen how she has, and I must say, she keeps herself composed. Any of the others, like Shannon or Claire, they'd be out of there in a minute. But not Kate."

Jack nodded. "Yeah. …It's just- if anything ever happened to her…" he trailed off, the sentence unfinished, leaving a thousand possibilities to fill it in.


(A/N: I know, I know, short chapter. Next chapter is just going to be so spiffy, I hope. Next chapter: Two very vital characters to this story get in a fight, and all of the survivors will be there to see it. :) )