Being the independent woman that she was, Ana decided to go after Arzt all by herself. She followed whichever path her heart told her to, sprinting blindly towards what she hoped was the man she loved. Unfortunately, she got lost immediately. As much as she hated to turn back, she tried in vain to retrace her steps, only ending up deeper in the jungle. Determined to keep going, Ana pushed on, through the trees, looking for any sign of life. She obliviously pushed some foliage out of the way, and came upon a small clearing, but it was already occupied.
"Oh, sht!" Ana blurted out, covering her face with her hands. Because this clearing was occupied by Jack and Kate, and while covering your eyes when you see them is a silly thing to do, it was polite in this situation. Kate looked like she was in total shock, and Jack began cursing obscenely before getting off the ground. Ana turned her back to them out of respect while they pulled some clothes back on, biting her lip.
"What the hell are you guys doing out here?" Ana demanded, still not turning around.
"I woulda thought that was obvious, Ana." Kate spat back, clearly very annoyed by the interruption.
Ana began to turn around to yell at her, a snappy comment already halfway out her mouth, but then she remembered why she was facing the other way in the first place and spun back around.
"I mean what are you doing this far away from everything, Kate. I've been searching for the camp for ages, because -- Oh god, Leslie!" Ana suddenly remembered how The Others had taken Arzt, and panic flooded over her. She turned around without thinking, and ignored Kate's screams of protest as she flung her arms over her bare chest protectively. Ana walked up to Jack (who was wearing only his jeans), and quickly explained the whole thing to him. Jack considered it, and decided that even though no one liked Arzt much, he was the hero and needed to save everyone. Even the damn high school science teachers.
So he would gather together a search party, and they'd leave as soon as possible.
"Thank you!" Ana said happily and threw her arms around Jack's neck. Kate immediately pushed her off angrily, forgetting about her topless body. Jack turned to Kate and apologised for having to leave her again, and said they'd continue what they were doing later.
Kate protested against staying behind, and her and Jack were soon deep into one of their famous 'You're-not-coming-into-the-jungle-yes-I-am' arguments. Ana shook her head; glad her and Arzt never had these kinds of disagreements. He never wanted to go into the jungle.
She yelled over their voices for a while until they paid attention to her.
"We need to go back. Where is camp? Or the hatch? I have no idea where we are." She stated. Jack and Kate stared at her.
"The hatch is like, right there." Kate said pointing to her right. Ana turned to look, and it was true, the hatch was right there!
Ana grinned. "Great! Let's do this search party thing, then. Wait… you guys know you were like, doing, uh, stuff… right where people could come out and see you, right?"
Jack shrugged. "We were desperate. At least, until you killed the mood, mood-killer."
"Yeah," Kate joined in, then realised her and Jack hadn't finished their argument. She turned back to him. "I am coming."
"No, you're not."
"Yes, I am. You can't stop me."
"Yes I can. I'm older than you."
Ana scowled as they continued on, and she went over to the hatch and went in. Jack and Kate followed her, still yelling.
-oOo-
Half an hour later, they had two search parties. Ana, Jack, Kate (she had finally persuaded Jack to let her come), Sayid, Locke, and Sawyer were going to go one way, and a bunch of randoms the other. No one expected the randoms to even come back alive, let alone find Arzt. And no one said it was stupid for all the good trackers to go together, 'cos no one wanted to disagree with Jack. The two groups set off in opposite directions. Ana's group had been walking for a couple of minutes, before they heard the unmistakeable sound of the monster, followed by ear-piercing screams. They looked at each other nervously, all knowing what had happened.
"Look on the bright side, at least it was just randoms," Kate said.
"Yeah, no one's gonna miss their flashbacks," Sayid agreed.
"And we get more boar now!" Locke exclaimed. "Though I will miss Steve… he had nice hair… soft…"
All that got him was strange looks, and everyone stepping slightly away from the older man.
"Okay…" Jack started cautiously. "We should… keep going…"
Everyone quickly agreed, and they kept going, looking for any sign of Arzt.
"Hey, since the others, uh… since they can't really look for him any more, shouldn't we split up…" Ana said. "We would have more chance of finding Leslie."
"We're not splitting up, mood-killer." Jack said, quickly becoming fond of his new nickname for her.
Ana scowled, but shut up. They'd find Leslie quicker if she co-operated, even if she didn't really like to. Leslie was the priority here, and she would do anything to find him.