Jack, despite his breathlessness, went about gathering up his tools from the storeroom and desktop. He produced his penlight and pushed open Hurley's eyes, getting the proper pupil reaction when he shone the light into them. Then he climbed up the ladder and did the same to Sawyer, bent over awkwardly to compensate for the close ceiling.
Sawyer's face was sallow and his skin burning when Jack touched it, his pupils reacting minimally to the penlight. He put the light between his teeth and worked Sawyer out of his shirt, throwing it to the floor, trying to cool him down.
As he was climbing back down the ladder, Sayid asked, "what is wrong with them?"
"I don't know," Jack said somewhat irritably, going back to Hurley and feeling his forehead, he didn't feel as nearly as hot as Sawyer did. "Sawyer has a high fever. And Hurley complained of nausea before he passed out in the jungle..." he went out into the kitchen and returned with a mop bucket, a wet towel, and another towel full of ice cubes. Sayid and Locke were talking.
"Perhaps it is the fever that Henry talked of." Sayid said, one hand holding his other at the elbow, his chin in his hand, looking concernedly from Locke to the armory where their shifty captive was still being held.
"What fever?" Jack asked, putting the bucket down next to Hurley's bedside and then climbing up the ladder again. Untying Sawyer's shoes and pulling him out of his pants, pressing the ice against Sawyer's face and neck and chest intermittently.
"Henry talked of a fever that killed his wife." Sayid called up to him.
"Do you think he was lying?" John asked.
"Normally, I would think yes. However, Rousseau also talked of it." Sayid explained. "It seems it was the fever that drove her to kill her research team. It had turned them delirious."
"Hurley doesn't have a fever." Jack stated, looking down towards the men on the floor.
"Perhaps he ate something?" Sayid mentioned. and Jack'smind went whizzing through possibilities, food poisoning, overripe fruit, bad fish, gamey boar,accidentallyeating a poisonous bug…
"Were they together when Sawyer blacked out?" Locke asked.
"I don't know John," Jack answered honestly. Either they were or Hurley had happened across Sawyer, it was anybody's guess.
"Then I guess we'll have to wait until one regains consciousness." Locke stated obviously, crossing his arms over his chest.
"Not very long," Sayid said, leaning over, "I believe Hurley is awakening."
Jack heard a moan and felt the bed move as Hurley moved, Jack leaving the towel spread across Sawyer's chest as he stumbled quickly down the ladder.
"Easy," Jack said, helping Hurley to sit up, letting him move his legs move off the side of the bed. The boy looked a little green, licking at his sour mouth with a dry tongue.
Hurley expelled rolls of sick-ripe breath, "dude," he gasped, snatching the bucket quickly from the floor and managing to pull it into his lap before he threw up again. This one was less productive than the ones in the jungle had been, only managing to expel a little white spit from his system.
"Can I have some water?" Hurley asked, wiping his face with the back of his hand.
"Not while you're puking, you won't be able to keep it down." Jack handed him the wet towel to clean off his face with instead, sitting down next to him on the bed. "Do you know what's making you sick Hurley?"
Hurley dry heaved before he answered. "No, man."
John and Sayid stood silently in their places, watching.
"Was it something you ate?" Jack asked.
"No." Hurley dry heaved again, figuring that while eating an eighth of a large tub of tepid ranch dressing would make him ill, it wouldn't make him this sick. It had to be something else.
"You're sure?" Jack emphasized, and when Hurley nodded and gagged, he believed him. "Okay. So, take me through your day. I want to know what you did, what you might've come in contact with, anything that you think might've made you sick."
Far from willing to divulge his food stash, Hurley kept the details scarce, until he came to the frog-hunt Sawyer'd negotiated him into. "…and then Sawyer came by because some tree frog was annoying him and asked me if I would help him look for it. And we found it and he smashed it."
Jack blinked. "Anything else?"
"No dude, that was it." Hurley dry heaved once more, a timid one, before letting his head fall back against the side of the top bunk, closing his eyes.
Locke's brow was furrowed. "Are you sure it was a tree frog? What did it look like?" He asked after a moment.
"I dunno man, like a frog…" Hurley looked up with one eye, his head swimming while his stomach roiled.
"Was it mottled? Or patterned? All green?" His questions were calm.
"Uh." Hurley had to dig deep beneath the sickness to find the memory. "It was black …and green…?"
"Bright green?" Locke asked.
"I think so…" Hurley managed another dry heave, then resumed panting.
Locke's face became more intense and just the sound "hmm," came out from between his lips.
"You wanna help me out here John?" Jack asked with a sharp tone, figuring Locke had been prodding because he knew the reason why Hurley was sick.
John took a moment before answering, rubbing a finger across his lips. "I think he and Sawyer might have come across a Dendrobates auratus."
"A what?" Jack asked impatiently.
"A Poison Arrow Frog, I caughta glimpse of a couple of them while I was exploring the jungle. They secrete a poison from their skin when a predator comes in contact with them, usually when it tries to eat them. There's even a tribe in South America that rubs their spearheads in it to aid them in hunting…"
Jack pushed himself to his feet, "what are the effects?" his dark eyes were intense.
"I'm not positive," Locke said directly. "but I think that if it's ingested it can cause paralysis or even be fatal."
"Did you eat it Hurley?" Jack turned back to Hurley quickly.
Hurley suddenly looked crestfallen. "Dude. Do you really think I would have eaten a frog?"
Jack was about to correct himself when Sayid stepped in, "he's simply saying that the food has become rather monotonous lately. Perhaps you were interested in trying a different-"
"No." Hurley interrupted coldly, "I didn't eat the frog. Sawyer smashed it and then put it in my hand. And all because he's a jackass who wouldn't just let me take it somewhere else…"
Jack stood there for a moment then went out of the kitchen and came back with two wetted and soapy towels, throwing one at Hurley. "Wash your hands and anything you might've touched after Sawyer handed you that frog." He directed as he climbed up the ladder with the other towel, washing both of Sawyer's hands like he would have if he were scrubbing in for surgery, getting in between his fingers and all the way up to his elbows.
"Did Sawyer touch anything else?" Jack asked as he was climbing back down, taking the towel from Hurley.
"Uh, I think he wiped it on his pants." Hurley recalled.
And Jack snatched Sawyer's jeans from the end of the bed by the cuff, carefully hanging it away from his body and shaking them, a wallet falling out of the worn back pocket. Then he pulled the belt loose from the loops and set them both on the desktop.
"Do you think you're going to be sick anymore?" Jack asked hopefully, wanting the bucket.
"No. Take it." Hurley was glad to be rid of thestinky bucket, somewhat surprised when Jack shoved the jeans and the used towels straight into it, which made an unpleasant shlucking sound.
"John." Jack said, "do you know where any matches are?"
"Uh, yes." Locke disappeared into the storeroom and came back holding a box of them.
"Sayid, you stay with Hurley. If Sawyer wakes up, keep him from moving around, I'll be back in a second." He watched Sayid nod understandingly before he and John went out of the front door to the hatch, closing it behind them.
Jack put the bucket on the ground and closed his eyes for a moment, trying to catch his racing mind.
"Jack?" Locke asked quietly.
Jack opened his eyes and looked over to the man,hoping that whatever he was aboutto say wouldn't fryhis last nerve.
"Both you and I know that this would be the perfect opportunity to find where Sawyer hid those guns…" his comment sounded offhand, his eyes turned up to the glimmering sky between the tree.
Jack thought for a long moment, choosing his answer carefully. "As much as I'd love to go into the jungle to find them, I can't. I've got Sawyer to deal with, that man in the armory, and making sure no one else comes into this hatch until I can figure out what the hell we're going to do about all three of those. Maybe when Sawyer wakes up..."
John smiled oddly, still looking up. "Do you really think he's going to give up the location of the guns that easily?"
"I don't know John," Jack said aggrivatedly, fumbling for a match from the box and trying to get it to light, whenit didn't, he hurled it to the ground in anger. "...if he's in shock, it's possible."
"He's aresidual man," Locke continued, "even if he's close to death. He's not afraid of it, I believe he wants it."
"Yeah well..." Jack tried to light another one, seething. Sawyer may be thebiggest pain in the ass Jack had ever come across, but he didn't wish him dead, his constitution wouldn't allow him to say it outloud."...then I guess we better hope Sawyer talks in his sleep again." Jack tried to light a third one.
Lockefinally turned to look at Jack, still smiling. "I'd stop tryingif I were you."
"Trying what?" Jack hissed through clenched teeth, infuriated.
"It's going to rain any second now." Locke held his arms outstretched, alsoholding uptwo fingers and thumb on one hand,folding them down slowly. His thumb curled in just as a torrentialshower of rain came pelting down from the sky, instantly soaking them.
They stood there in an uncomfortable silence, until a faint sound and a voice said, "having a barbeque in the rain?"
"Kate." Jack stated as the dark haired girl emerged from the jungle, smiling pleasantly through her wet hair. "what are you doing here?" This was great. Just what he needed.
"I'm here for my shift Jack, I replace John." Kate said bemusedly, her thumbs tucked under the straps of her backpack.
"It's alright, I've got it." Jack tried, finally dropping the last useless match into the bucket. "You should get back to the beach, it's drier under your tent."
"Uh. It's also dry in the hatch, if you'd let me by." Her eyes fell on the bucket and its contents, "were you about to burn clothes?" she asked confusedly.
Jack couldn't squirm out of this one, "yeah."
"Who's?" But the look on his face told her he wasn't going to say right away, "what's going on Jack?" She eyed the two men suspiciously.
"Look Kate," Jack broke down, figuring letting her know the truth would be better than pussyfooting around it, he was tired of lies."Sawyer and Hurley are in there, and they're sick."
"Sawyer's sick?" her eyes brightened in concern, and she made a move towards the door, only to have Jack step in front of her. "How sick? What happened to him?"
"I can't let you go in-" Jack began, yelling slightly over the rain.
"It was a Poison Arrow Frog, they found one in the jungle." Locke interrupted and Kate just blinked at him.
"A Poison Arrow Frog…" those words sounded so familiar and yet foreign to her. Her mind still racing over the fact that Sawyer was sick and needed taken care of. "So wait, you were about to burn his clothes?"
Jack looked intensely into her eyes, being up front with her. "There's already too many people involved, you're not going to be any help to me or anyone else in there."
"Who?" Kate countered stiffly. "Who else is involved? And what are you talking about? I helped before!"
"This is completely different." Jack took a step forward. "Please Kate," he urged, "go back to the beach. I swear you'll be the first to know if something happens."
"I'm not going anywhere Jack." Kate's face was tense, her jaw set.
Jack took a minute to think, "fine, but you stay out here. And John will also stay out here with you." Jack looked over his shoulder towards Locke, seeing him nod.
Then he sighed heavily, and pointed towards the bucket. "When the rain stops, burn that down until it smolders. Then just leave it, I'll take care of it when I come back out. And don't let anyone come into this hatch, no matter what."
He looked at Kate with one final intense look of 'follow my orders' before he turned on his heel and went into the hatch, making sure to airlock the door behind him. Leaving them to stand outside in the rain.
gah. if any of the characters slip out of character i'm sorry. my brain can really only wrap around two people at a time. and i kind of screwed myself over adding a third person. Locke sounds way off. i realize that. sorry. Locke's a tricky kid to talk for...