I am SO sorry that it has taken me so long to get this chapter out...or this first half of the chapter anyway. Sorry! Writer's block is a pain in my ass as is dead laptops (AGAIN!) and work. But here it is and a warning, this chapter's a bit of a doozy. I hope what I've written is actually understandable because there's lots of talk in this chappy and I confused myself at some points. Lemme know if it's too stupid to understand.

And without further ado (coz you've all waited too long for this) I give you...

p.s Disclaimer: Me no owny!

Chapter 18 (part 1).

Tracy was gone now. Snatched while they argued about who would go back to the hatch with the first group of survivors and who would return to the beach and risk their lives. Tracy who a mere few moments earlier had annoyed Ana to a point only ever achieved before by a certain Southern Conman. Tracy who she had failed. Tracy who was lost…

Guilt swirled faster and more wildly in Ana's stomach and in response to it she quickened her sprint, pulling ahead of the brunette, who had ultimately gotten her own interfering way to accompany Ana back to the beach and the next group of people, and had previously been keeping pace with her.

The jungle was silent again and in gaps and flashes between the trees ahead, they could glimpse the blue of the sky and the sea turning slowly into an inky black as the sun sank below the horizon, taking their hopes with it.

"I've got a bad feeling about this…"

oOo

"Why!" Locke demanded of Nora, showing a flash of anger that was very rarely ever seen across the face of the usually annoyingly placid man. "Why go through all the trouble of capturing Cindy and Walt only to let one go and for the other to be of no use to you!"

He was furious now, Sawyer could tell from the way he paced the room like a caged tiger, fists balling themselves and clenching at his sides, turning knuckles bone-white. No doubt he was feeling the same urges that had consumed both Michael and Sawyer himself, provoking them to attack Nora in their separate moments of fury.

"Who do you really want, if not them?" Locke continued to rage.

But Nora neither flinched beneath the older man's ire nor acknowledged the dangerous tone lancing through his words like a blade. Instead she crouched down in front of Walt, sat perched upon the narrow medical cot, and shared an almost friendly, conspiratorial wink. As if they were sharing some private joke, but a frown that drew down the boy's brow, betraying his dislike of the woman before him.

"Shall we tell them, Walter?" she mused lightly. "Shall we let them in on our little secret?"

Michael moved before she had even finished speaking. Stepping between her and his son and breaking their eye contact so abruptly that Nora took a reeling step back, involuntarily, standing bolt upright.

"You don't speak to my boy!" Mike ground from between teeth clenched so tight that a muscle twitched in his jaw. His voice was low and distorted with hate, the light in his eyes and the look on his face was as deadly as Locke's was. "You don't come near him! You don't touch him! You don't even look at him! Am I clear?"

Nora stubbornly clenched her own teeth and pursed her lips, draining them of all colour until they held a deathly pallor. Her dark eyes narrowed to slits of jet as she glanced up into Michael's fearsome visage until finally, begrudgingly, she nodded. She understood.

"You got something to say, you say it to me!" he added, turning to heft the ten year old boy back into the safety of his arms and pacing to the other side of the room, as far away from the slight woman as was possible in the restricted space.

"Fine." She snorted, taking the space that Walt had previously occupied upon the bed, crossing her legs and leaning back against the wall as if she were getting herself comfortable. "We took Walt for his aptitude. His telepathic abilities. To study it." She began, smoothing her filthy, ragged clothing straight, as if they were made out of silk, before looking them each in the eyes in turn. "We discovered through the Ethan and Charlie Pace incident that the larger survivor community was far more difficult to infiltrate than those who survived from the tail section of your plane. The group was more united for one and harder to influence in the way Goodwin did, with Mr Eko and his…compatriots, in the case of Nathan…" deft, slim, grubby fingers flicked at the creases in her shirt again before settling back into her lap, clasped and still bound. "Walt served another purpose for us when he appeared to Shannon and provoked the shooting. That episode, while it was considered a failure in it's primary purpose – removing Ana-Lucia from the equation – still caused a sufficient rift between the groups to be considered an ultimate success. Actually, it worked out better than expected as Shannon survived. We were reluctant to sacrifice her in the beginning, but such sacrifices must be made from time to time in order to ensure sufficient progress." She paused to breathe and swallow, noting the horrified looks adoring all of their separate faces with something akin to smug triumph upon her own, before she continued. "Then we used Walt again," she shrugged as if it was merely a minor detail. "Done with our test and study concerning his abilities, we used him to send messages through the computer systems to you, Michael. Following that, we always knew it would not be a very lengthy period of time before you embarked upon such a foolish and futile expedition as you find yourselves upon now." The cold, bitter light sparked in her eyes once more as she spoke, lowering her voice until it thrummed out to them all from the back of her throat. "Walt was the bait, I'm afraid, and you all played right into our hands down to the very people that you chose to accompany you upon your quest!" she laughed, the air leaving her lungs in short bursts of hilarity. "You gathered together the best people for your mission, yes, but in doing so, you also killed any chance that the survivor group back at you 'home' on the beach ever had of reuniting and becoming one. Any chance that they had of working together, of being amalgamated to face my colleagues when the arrive there, any chance that they have of surviving died when you put together your merry band of men!"

Silence filled the room. Stunned and appalled at what the Others' woman had just suggested to them. They could only stand there, in a combined daze until her laughter had run it's course and she settled herself, calm once again.

"Now, as to one of your prior queries," she continued, ignoring their reticence and before any of them could come to their senses properly and interrupt her with demands and threats. "Who do we really want? I should've thought that was obvious by now…" she scoffed. "Or are you all so thoroughly blinded by your own arrogance and ignorance that you do not even see wha-"

"Answer the question." Sayid's voice rang out, smothering Nora's words with an icy, clipped tone of neatly controlled fury and she shot him a withering glance, rolling her eyes either at the Iraqi's interruption of her monologue or at all of the continued cluelessness.

"The women," she snarled in impatience. "Claire Littleton was the first, the primary target, as she was almost full term with her pregnancy. Ethan managed to retrieve her successfully but our…tests were never completed before she escaped with aid of one of our own…Goodwin was sent for our secondary target. Cindy. Only three months pregnant and yet that was an easier option than impregnation upon this island. Not that we don't have the facilities," she hastened to assure them. "No, that is why we let her go. It was easier to move her by letting you do the job for us…or Kate rather." She smirked again and snorted once. "Natural impregnation always yields better results for some bizarre reason…Curious really, we've never figured out why that-"

"Remain on the point!" Sayid snapped again and Sawyer, only just coming out of his shock induced stupor, standing dazed, horrified and more than a little confused, leant against the wall, flashed a glance at his usually collected companion.

"Fine." Nora sniffed indignantly, tossing her head to shift the ropey blonde locks that had fallen into her view, obscuring it partially. "Following our primary and secondary targets come the other women. Tertiary priorities if you will. Both Goodwin and Ethan were sent to make lists of the good candidates, ones that met with the desired criteria, and the bad ones, to be avoided or disposed of if they caused too many problems." She smiled again, her eyes losing their focus ever so briefly as she stared past them into nothing, perhaps remembering the two Other men that she had named and who had both lost their lives in the pursuit of their orders. "A little side quest for them to fulfil whist going after their main objectives…"

Locke cleared his throat suddenly, drawing Nora's gaze to him, raising her eyebrows and making her resemble a school teacher waiting for a correct answer from a student instead of the woman that she actually was.

"Eko…said that the list of Goodwin's included both men and women. They tried to take Eko himself on that first night." He countered from behind a hand that smoothed across his jaw pensively. His anger had receeded now, so that it was concealed and kept in check once more, though it lurked dangerously close to the surface of his calm exterior.

And Nora yawned, turning her eyes to the ceiling as if she were becoming bored by them and theur constant questions and demands.

"We needed the sperm from somewhere…" she shrugged nonchalantly, again turning the revelation into a seemingly trivial mention. "And that expedition upon the first night was highly successful, therefore, my companions will have no need to bother with the remaining male population of your little…community." She paused and suddenly her dark, amused eyes lanced down from the ceiling to meet with Sawyer's, glinting at him with barely concealed mirth and boring holes through his own sapphire glare. "And nor will they need to bother with Ana-Lucia…"

oOo

"Thanks." Kate breathed as they broached the tree line and drew to a halt in order to gain their breath and strength for the return journey to the hatch.

Ana flickered a glance over her shoulder at the smaller woman, leaning back against a palm tree in the beginnings of exertion, before turning her gaze out to where the group of people stood huddled together around a fire that someone had obviously lit to ward away the coming night.

"For what?" she responded briefly, catching her own breath and a little confused at why Kate had chosen that particular moment to attempt to strike up a conversation between them after the long moments of silence in the jungle. She tucked her handgun into the back of her belt and secured her rifle, slung across her shoulder. It wouldn't do to panic everyone by letting them see her with a weapon, loaded and cocked.

Kate mimicked her actions before speaking again, a little less breathlessly.

"For letting me come along," she responded, tugging the straps of her own rifle and Jack's backpack, filled with ammunition, further into her own shoulders. "I needed to do this…Jack doesn't understand that sometimes." She considered her own words, tilting her head at a jaunty angle, like a bird considering something on the ground far below it's nest. "…Most of the time, actually."

"Jack's just looking out for you," Ana replied, feeling the urge to defend Jack at least a little while the woman before her, supposedly his partner, spoke out so openly against him. She kept her voice light, however, watching as Kate reached around her back and retrieved a bottle of water from the pack. "Maybe that's something that he needs to do for himself, but if you've got demons you have to face, Kate, who are he and I to stop you?"

And Kate nodded, subdued, taking in Ana's words as she sipped at her water, hand pressing at a stitch of pain in her side. And even as she did, Ana felt a wry smile curling her own lips up.

"Besides," she chuckled, shaking her head at the ironic words that she was next to say. "I know that you can fight, Kate. And I'd rather have you watching my ass right now than anyone else."

Kate's face was such a picture of shock that Ana nearly choked on her own laughter. Green eyes wide and more than a little confused at what had just been spoken between them. Perhaps a little disbelieving of it too. She glanced away to the ground before her with a frown, opening her mouth to question either what Ana had just said or the Latino woman's sanity in that moment, but then she snapped it shut again, remaining silent until she herself chuckled and shook her head.

"Even Sawyer?" her tone was teasing, emerald irises meeting Ana's narrowed gaze again and this time the spark and fire that had burned between them so long ago when they had faced off against one another in the caves, returned though at a more reduced level. It was amused this time, not furious and Ana's smile widened to a grin in reply.

"Let's not get too carried away, Chica."

And the slim brunette laughed out loud at the other woman's growled, feigned irritated response as they lingered a little longer on the tree line. Louder and more genuine than Ana had heard her laugh in the entire time that they had known one another.

"Yeah, well, for what it's worth," Kate stated, pausing briefly to take another slug of water from her bottle before offering it over to her 'sister in arms'. "The feeling's mutual."

Ana's eyebrows rose up her forehead at that.

"That right?" she mused with another suppressed laugh, nodding her thanks for the offered water and drinking her fill before returning it. "And you'd rather have me watching your ass, than Jack?"

Kate could only nod, mouth full again, and Ana slitted her eyes, smirking thinly and raising her chin in a jerk of challenge.

"And what about Sawyer?"

Kate snorted, almost spraying her last mouthful of liquid out and over Ana-Lucia, in amusement. She swallowed, the back of her hand to her mouth to remove any access water from her lips and chin, shrugged and then gave an exaggerated sigh.

"C'mon, Ana. And besides, you know what they say, never send a man to do a woman's job."

oOo

I hope it's been worth the wait...