Wow! I am really, really happy to see that Im getting new readers. This is so exciting. I just wanted to let everybody know that my chapters ARE short, but thats because Im pacing the story… making sure you guys actually review me. As a treat, Im making this one a bit longer.

MistyX- The truth is; Im already done with the story. Ive just finished it yesterday, and trust me, it was a tough closing. Im actually working on a sequel now, which I think Im going to leave under the same title, not sure. But, anyways, as I was writing… I couldn't decide who I was going to pick. The thing about me is that Im a DIEHARD Jater, but after watching all of Season 1 over again, I fell for Skate as well. I call myself a JSKater now… heh. I was really, really stuck about choosing what to do… but I did it. Im not good at summaries at all, thats why the summary to this story sucked so bad. I truly wrote it so everybody could guess, and maybe the reviews I got would help me with my decision. Ive already posted this story on some Lost forums, which is where I initially posted it and came to my decision. Thanks so much for reading, its very, very much appreciated

Chapter 5

Sawyer walked next to Ana as Paul led the way. He hadn't noticed earlier, but his shoulder hurt like a son of a bitch, to put it mildly. He knew that when he returned to everybody, doc Jack would be more than ecstatic to take a look at it, he thought to himself, grinning.

"So, Sawyer, what'd you used to do before landing on this hell hole of an island?" Ana Lucia asked, interrupting Sawyers thoughts.

Sawyer was about to comment on her nickname for the island, remember the way he'd heard it and said it so many times, but thought better of it.

"Well," he began. He really didn't know what to say this time. Everytime anyone would ask him what his profession was, he'd stop and think about something new to say. Ever since landing on the island, though, he knew he had to stick to an occupation, or things would start getting suspicious. The only person he had told the truth to was Kate, and even then, he didn't tell the whole truth. "I'm a businessman," he lied. After all, it wasn't a total lie, he told himself every time he uttered the sentence, trying to relieve his conscience.

"Nice," she replied, looking at Sawyer and nodding her head. She smiled at him, noticing for the first time how handsome he was. He had the perfect facial structure and f lowing golden hair. His body was perfect, muscular in all the right places.

"What about you?" Sawyer asked, wincing at the pain from his shoulder yet again.

"I'm a-" she started, but was interrupted by Paul's sudden yelling.

"Look over there!" he shouted, pointing to something in the distance.

"There are people there!" Ana said, excited. "Let's go!"

They all began running, including Sawyer. He couldn't tell who those people were, but he had a gut feeling it was someone he knew.
- ----
"Let's go," Jack got up, smiling down at Kate, and offered a hand to her. Kate put her hand into his as he helped her up.

"So, where do we go from here?" Kate asked, sighing. This was going to be harder than she thought. There were no clues whatsoever… he could be anywhere.

Before Jack had the opportunity to answer, however, they heard screams and yells.

Jack and Kate looked in the direction of the inaudible screams and saw that three figures were walking towards them. They saw the faces of two people who they didn't know, but overlooked them onto Sawyer.

"SAWYER!" Kate screamed and started running towards him. She jumped on him, almost making Sawyer lose his balance.

"Did somebody miss me?" Sawyer said, sarcastically, hugging Kate back.

As Kate released him, she noticed his shoulder began to bleed.

"Oh my God, I'm so sorry." She wished she remembered about his shoulder. It hurt him, but he had said nothing about it and accepted her hug.

"It's fine," he shrugged it off, cringing again. "Well hello Jacko," Sawyer said, sarcastically. He interrupted Jack's stare at Kate. He had never seen her this happy before.

"Hey Sawyer. Glad to see you're alive and everything Kate told us was right," Jack said, sounding less than 'glad'.

"Kate?"

"Yea, she found you on the beach and came to tell us, but your body was gone."

"We took him," Ana Lucia joined into the conversation. "I'm Ana Lucia and this is Paul," she said, smiling at the strangers and nodding towards Paul, who had a look of shock on his face.

Something was awfully wrong. Jack stared at Ana, remembering his past encounter with her. She had survived. He remembered the instant chemistry that formed between them.
While Jack remembered, Kate remembered too. Her jaw dropped as she remembered the man sitting in the back of the plane who had been back up for the marshal.

"Well, well, well. If it isn't Kate."

Kate stared at Paul, remembering remorsefully everything that happened before the plane crash. She recalled how, at the last minute, the Australian law enforcement had decided he would come along. After all, if Kate needed five guns, she probably needed several officers to use them. She remembered the evil look on the marshal's face when he told her about Paul, basically telling her that if she tried anything, they'd shoot her in a heartbeat. When she saw Paul, she could tell by the innocent looks in his eyes that he was less dangerous as the marshal, but he was still her enemy. Kate was silent and staring, telling Jack something was dreadfully wrong.

"Kate? Do you know him?" Jack asked the obvious. Everyone was turned looking at Kate and Paul now. Both Sawyer and Jack knew that she was an escorted prisoner on the plane, so she decided to tell them.

"He was backup for the marshal on the flight," she mumbled, looking down at the ground.

"Gee whiz Freckles!" Sawyer exclaimed, wide-eyed. She must have done something big to deserve two officers watching her every move.

Ana-Lucia looked at Paul. "You told me you were a computer engineer," she exclaimed, glaring at Paul. "Now, all of the sudden, you're an officer?"

Paul sighed. He hated his job so much. It required someone who was willing to be an authority figure and take risks to ensure justice, but he was nothing like that. He would never shoot anybody, no matter how bad they were.

"We, uh, need to start heading back now," Jack interrupted the silence and picked up his pack as everybody else but Sawyer did the same. He led the way, with Ana Lucia at his side.

"So," she smiled up at him. "You're alive."

"Yea, and so are you," Jack said, smiling back. They talked about how the plane had crashed and how they had each survived. Jack told her about how they had seen the monster, and Ana had sighed, telling him they'd come across it as well. It had taken the other two survivors who were with them.

"That's why we were so happy when we found Sawyer. We knew that meant that there were others…" she said, reminiscing.

Jack looked at her. She was so audacious… the way she had come up and started talking to him at the airport bar.
------

Once they arrived, Jack asked Sayid to get everybody to have a seat in the caves. He decided he needed to tell them about Ana and Paul, and to tell them that Kate was right about Sawyer.

Sawyer hadn't seen Jin at first, but when Jack mentioned him in the story about the raft, Sawyer saw him. He walked up to him and gave him a very awkward hug. He couldn't say anything to him, but he knew that Jin was a part of his survival.
After the meeting, Charlie, Hurley and Sayid went up to Kate and apologized. Kate smiled, a symbol for telling them it was okay.

Jack came over to Sawyer who was situating his stuff in a corner of the caves.

"Mind if I take a look at your shoulder?" Jack asked, not waiting for an answer as he took off the whit shirt used as a bandage.

"Careful doc," Sawyer said, biting his lip to hold in the pain. It seemed that whenever he forgot about it, it didn't hurt, but as soon as someone touched it, he felt like he was going to be sick from the pain.

Jack poured something into Sawyer's wound, which had him cursing the day he was born. Once it was over, Sawyer glared at Jack.

"I bet you loved that didn'tchya?" Sawyer asked, still grimacing from the pain.

Jack smiled and raised his eyebrows, a basic yes in Sawyer's book. Jack began bandaging Sawyer's arm, remembering everything Sawyer had told him four days ago about his father. He finally knew the truth and it felt like a weight was lifted off his shoulders. He now had the chance of letting his father go, letting his past which ate at his insides go, and think of the future. He never thought Sawyer would be the one to give him this peace of mind, but he was. He didn't know how to thank Sawyer, with everything that has happened since arriving on the island being their barrier from being civil to one another.

Jack sighed, getting up and beginning to walk away.

"Doc?" Sawyer called after him. Jack turned around, wondering what Sawyer had to say. "Thanks."

"No problem." Jack said, smiling to himself. Maybe Sawyer really had changed.

-----
Kate walked up to Ana who was sitting on a blanket looking around. She was taking in the view of everybody and how they intermingled with each other. Occasionally, someone would walk up to her and introduce himself or herself, so Kate's sudden introduction didn't come as a surprise.

"Hey," Kate said, sitting down next to her. "We didn't get a proper chance to be introduced earlier," she said, smiling. "My name is Kate, and you're Ana Lucia."

"Right on," Ana said, laughing.

"I can't believe we didn't know you guys existed. This island must be pretty big," Kate said, amazed.

"I know, it's hard to believe. This island sure is something."

"Yea. So, you and Jack met before?" Kate asked, curiosity taking over her. She saw the way they looked at each other a couple of hours before. There was obviously something between them.

"Yea we did. Right before we boarded our plane I met him at the bar," she said, reminiscing. "I figured he could use some company…"

"Oh, really?"

"Yea, I heard him screaming at someone on the phone earlier and I saw that he looked lonely,"

"Oh," was all Kate managed to say. "Well, he's a great guy."

"Yea, he is. I could tell that just from ten minutes of speaking to him," she said, smirking.

Kate smiled the fakest smile she had ever plastered on her face in all her life. She didn't know why she felt this way… Jack wasn't hers after all. She didn't even admit to herself that she liked Jack. Why did she feel so jealous? It's not like anything had even happened.

"Well, I've got to go. It was very nice meeting you," Kate said and walked off. She decided to go check on Sawyer and see how he was doing.

"How're you doing?" she interrupted, looking down at Sawyer who was reading a book. Boy did he look ridiculous in those glasses, she thought to herself.

"Why are you smilin', Freckles." Sawyer replied, not quite answering her question. She had a huge smirk on her face, which he figured was due to the way he looked in the glasses.

"I'm not smiling. How's your shoulder?" She lied and sat down, resting her arm on a suitcase.

"Fine. Doc fixed me up earlier," he told her and looked back down at his book.

"Well… I guess I'll leave you reading," Kate sighed and got up. Sawyer was obviously upset at her for something, and she really didn't feel like getting into a fight.

"Alrighty," Sawyer replied, not seeming to care. What Kate didn't know was that he was torn apart on the inside. Kate had obviously missed him, and frankly, he missed her too. He was troubled at the fact that she never said goodbye to him. Instead, she had gone off with Jack.

Before leaving, Kate glared at Sawyer. "Someone's PMSing," she thought to herself. She had been thrilled that he was alive and well… here in the same caves as her. "I guess he doesn't care," Kate concluded and walked off. For a minute, she thought he changed. "Guess I was wrong."