"It's the devil I know
or the devil I don't."
The Clarks
Chapter Twenty-Eight
"So, you all were on a raft?" Ana asks, sounding skeptical, but Heather can tell that she more or less believes it—or at least believes that if this is their story, they are sticking to it.
"Yes." Heather replies. Michael and Sawyer know better than to make a fuss about this. Heather had taken the initiative in telling the story, as she opted towards generosity, explaining the situation as best she could to Ana Lucia and Mr. Eko, as well as a woman named Libby, who Mr. Eko had retrieved from not far off, where she more or less had been stationed by Ana. For all intents and purposes, Michael and Sawyer seem to understand why Heather is telling the story as if she were on the raft as well. After all, it boded better than trying to explain her true involvement.
"And these… Others, they took your son?"
"Walt," Michael responds, nodding.
"And then they destroyed your raft."
"Hold on," Heather raises her hand—the one without the gun in it. "Why are you acting so incredulous?" She is watching Ana Lucia with an intent gaze, who tenses at being called into question. "You're acting as if you have no idea who these Others are, or could be."
"You think I do?" The remark is biting, as if Heather is implying more than she really is by asking. Mr. Eko remains silent, but Heather can easily see the cool intelligence at work behind his eyes. The other woman, Libby, appears anxious, though she is trying to control it. They are all sitting in a loose circle, not far from the pit itself: one group of survivors on one side, the others opposite.
"I know you do." Now, 6 pairs of eyes turn to her, Jin's more following the rest. "Oh, come on," She responds, more so chiding her own group that anything. "The first thing you did when you saw us was had Mr. Eko here beat us unconscious."
"My apologies." This is the first thing he has said during the discussion, and Heather can see Sawyer moving towards some witty comment or another.
"No. I don't blame you-" She nods, but turns her hand palm up, in an accepting gesture.
"You don't?" Sawyer asks, sneering though the question.
"No. That's how I know that you know about the Others. If you didn't, why would your first reaction be violence? You would have cheered us, hailed us, brought us in with open arms after 40 some ugly days on an island. Instead you drug us into a hole."
"Get to the point." Ana is curt, but Heather knows that this is because she has highlighted the flaw in Ana's attempt to not let on more than she can.
"The point is, you know. You know, and you're scared shitless." Then, something occurs to her, and she asks, "How many survivors from the back were there?"
"23." The response is instantaneous, from Libby. There are two beats where Heather can feel the blood churning in her ears. She can see the fear in the blonde woman's eyes, and flashes of Ethan, or Ethan's handiwork on the beach, pulsate through her mind.
"How many now?"
"Why the fuck do you want to know!" Ana starts, standing up fast, infuriated. Mr. Eko tries to grab her wrist, but she jerks it away. Heather rises, gun held tight, stares straight into Ana's eyes. They are fairly evenly matched in height, but Heather is lankier, with less resounding muscle mass. If anything, Ana's reaction confirms what Heather has already begun to dread. Libby looks back and forth between the two other women, like a frightened animal.
"Answer the question, Libby. How many?" At this, Ana Lucia takes a swing at Heather, and the blow hits hard—Heather doesn't fall, but is obviously knocked off balance. The other woman hits again, a strike that knocks the wind out of her gut. Deserved that one, Heather thinks, taking it. She takes the next blows, focuses only on the gun tight in her hand. Her thoughts go loose, and she lets them—with each shock of pain, Heather thinks of Walt, of losing him. Maybe there is a masochist in her, because she does not fight back immediately. Michael, out of the rest of them, seems to sympathize with this, maybe knows why Heather is letting the shit get knocked out of her.
Sawyer has gotten to his feet, and his yells are lost in Libby's yells are lost in Jin's Korean yells (while he waves the machete that he has been given control over). Michael and Mr. Eko are primarily trying to stop Ana, but the woman elbow's Michael sharply in the throat when he tries to take hold of her. Mr. Eko stops to help him first.
Heather loses the fight to stay on her feet, crumples. You can't let this happen, you know, something utterly calm and resolved in her reasons. You have to get Walt, and this is just wasting time. Hurt yourself for it later. She slowly gets to her knees, and Ana kicks her back down to her side.
"Give me the gun."
Heather struggles to right herself again: "Fuck. You." Another kick in the ribs, and she goes down again. She isn't kicking me half as hard as she could. She isn't breaking my ribs. This means something, but Heather isn't quite sure what.
"I'm not asking again. Either you give it to me now, or I'll take it from you." Heather is leaning forward, on her knees but not straight, clutching her stomach and sides, gun still fiercely gripped in one hand. Jin and Sawyer are close, but Mr. Eko and Michael are still obstructing the path. Heather makes as if thinking for a moment, and then, hawks back and spits straight into Ana Lucia's lowered face. "Bitch," The woman's hisses, and then brings up her foot to kick Heather in the face.
Heather moves faster—Ana was focusing on power, finally intent on doing real damage, and in so, gave up some of the speed. Heather grabs the woman's ankle (not to mention slamming the side of the steel plated gun into the bone there), and wrenches her entire body up and to the side, pulling back. Ana Lucia falls back with a surprised grunt, and within moments, Heather brings her elbow down, square against the woman's jaw—while dazed, Heather twists the woman over as best she can, pushing her arm up behind her back, until Ana Lucia lets out a harsh, higher-pitched cry of pain.
Holding her arm in the high, awkward place behind her back, Heather makes sure that Ana can feel the barrel of the handgun placed flush against her head. Heather's face is bloody, but it's mostly from a busted lip and a cut right under her eye—the rest of Ana Lucia's hits had mainly been to her body.
"That's strike two. You might fight harder, chica, but you aren't very bright are you? I'm protecting me and mine, just like you. If you freak out on me again, I am going to shoot you. Do you understand me?" There is no reply, and Heather pushes the woman's arm higher up behind her back, until she is sure that any further, and it will break. Ana let's up a piercing yelp, and Heather can hear Eko start behind her, but Jin waves his machete at the bigger man, shouts something hostile in Korean. "I want a motherfucking answer!"
"Yes! YES!"
"Good." Heather takes Michael's hand, helping her up; Jin still has the blade of the machete tilted toward Mr. Eko. "Jin." The man looks to her, and Heather nods, both a thank you and relieving him of it. Then, she lets out an enormous sigh, one that sounds tired and near-exhausted even to her, and she can feel it all the way into her spine. They all look at her, and she feels that Eko is the one seeing her the most for what she is—Heather doesn't know whether to appreciate this, or be wary of it. He steps back from Jin, and then helps up Ana, who briskly tries to push him away, but then lets him.
"Six." Heather looks over at Libby, who has stepped forward. Her voice is shaking, but grows more confident. "There are six of us now." The news hits Heather like a freight train, visibly affecting her. She teeters for a moment, and Michael takes her elbow, keeps her up. Sawyer watches, but doesn't move from his spot.
"I want to see the rest of you." Heather says.
"Why?" The question does not come from them, but from Sawyer.
"Because they're coming back with us."
There is dead silence for a moment, and then Ana: "And what makes you think that's going to happen?"
"We've lost a handful, but only one was killed by… one of them."
"Not for lack of trying," Sawyer interjects, and Heather looks at him with a stark hostility—she is tired, pushed to the edge, and is done with putting up the fight.
"Can do you some simple math for me, Sawyer? Just let's try this. All of you." Her eyes are glaring, meets every one of them in turn, even Jin. "They had 22 people. Now they have six. That's a little over a quarter. Just about three out of every four people here are gone. Only one of ours has been directly killed, though there were two attempted murders, and two abductions-" Michael looks as if he's going to make a remark about this, but Heather just holds up a finger. "The choice seems pretty clear to me. You can come with us, live in some form of civilization, or you can stay here and wait to be picked off."
"Don't act like you know what's best for my people," Ana says, but there isn't any true viciousness to it. In fact, Heather can tell that the woman is weighing the option in her mind. And it's one she would immediately take, if I hadn't been the one to present it.
"Me and mine, remember?" Heather responds coldly. "I'm not campaigning, and I'm not going to drag anyone. But like I said, the facts speak for themselves."
"And why the hell do you care?" This, however, is a good question. Heather stops for a moment, at a loss.
"Because caring is what makes us human," She responds at last. It's clichéd, perhaps, but still true. "I have priorities, and one of them is getting Sawyer back to camp as quickly as possible, and then going to find Michael's son—but I can't let you all rot out here, just waiting for the axe to fall. Blame it on retaining some form of a conscious."
"That's what gets you killed," Ana says, but Heather can tell that she is giving in, despite her obvious displeasure with it. At least she can still think of what is best for hers.
"Hasn't yet," Heather retorts. Personally, she's thinking, And I'd rather that be the case, than hiding from it. The two eye each other like rivaling predators, and then Ana Lucia looks away.
"There's only two more. Cindy and Bernard. It won't take long." Ana's eyes meet hers again, with something fierce burning in them—with Heather can sense the definite wariness and hostility there, she sees that that isn't all of it: what she's seeing is hope. And for the briefest moment, there's almost something like gratitude. Whether this is for the option, or for taking the choice away from her—or if it's just her imagination fucking with her—Heather doesn't know. It's gone before she can be sure.
For the next mile or so, Heather and Ana stay close. They do not talk, and there is a certain harsh tension to them, like the rough, solid edges of two tectonic plates grinding against one another (waiting, perhaps, for another earthquake to cause).
But they walk, more or less, side by side.