Chapter 104
They stopped for a break in the afternoon; Sawyer was still concerned about Kate after her morning episode and he hovered over her as they rested, asking her if she wanted water, or shade, or a fan, basically bugging the crap out of her until she finally said, "James! I'm fine. Please just sit with me and relax."
He did, leaning against a tree trunk while Kate laid back with her head in his lap, she felt so safe and comfortable in his arms, as long as any part of him was touching her; as he stroked her hair the insects buzzed around them and the birds sang and Kate felt herself drifting off to the soft caress of his fingers and the soporific sunlight.
When she was softly snoring he glanced at Sara, who was sitting with Vincent, scratching his ears absently as she stared into the distance. She could feel Sawyer's eyes on her and she turned to him as Vincent looked up. "You okay?"
He nodded and smiled at her, flashing his dimples. "Thank you, Sara."
She smiled, ducking her head a little. "Thanks for what?"
He inclined his head at Kate, whose mouth was slightly open as she dozed. "For being there for her."
Sara grinned, her head still lowered. "It's okay. I...I love her." She looked a little embarrassed and kept her eyes averted from Sawyer, who had turned his eyes to Kate.
"Yeah," he said softly, "I do too." He smiled at her embarrassment. "She loves you too, Sara. You two are supposed to be together. That's why I brought you here."
She glanced up at him with some shock. "What?"
It was Sawyer's turn to be embarrassed and he wasn't used to the sensation; his cheeks blazed red and he mumbled, "I called you here." He looked up at her, fear in his eyes. "Don't be mad, I didn't know who you were, I just wished for...something and you came. But now I see that I was supposed to call you, for a different reason. You're here for Kate. She's going to need you."
Sara considered it for a moment. She was a little angry, but she knew he hadn't done it on purpose, not really. He had wished and she had come, like the answer to his prayer. And she was almost glad that she came; after only knowing Kate and Sawyer for a couple of days she felt like she had known them forever. And she loved them both, their joy, their sadness, their love itself; she was drawn to them, to the light inside. They were like the cool kids and she was the geek that followed them around but they treated her like one of them anyway. "I know she will." She smiled warmly and comfortingly at Sawyer. "I'll take care of her."
He smiled back, sadly, as he brushed a stray strand of hair from her face. "I know." He made sure Kate was sleeping before he said, "It's not going to be long now. A week. Maybe." He held his face up to the air, then he turned his blazing eyes on her, making her gasp a little. "Sara, don't let..." he paused as he tried to collect himself; tears were building in his throat, he could feel it clench up as he croaked, "Don't let her do anything crazy. She'll do anything to stop me and...she can't." Her head was suddenly heavy in his lap; his legs were breaking under the weight of her and he couldn't do it anymore, he couldn't touch her, or look at her, or hear her because it broke his heart and he wanted to run as far as he could so he didn't have to see her anymore, alone, cold, lonely- and a mother.
Sara rose and went to him, kneeling as a tear trickled down his cheek. She hesitated, then leaned over and hugged him. "It's okay, Sawyer. I won't let her do anything." He sobbed quietly against her shoulder for a second, being as silent as possible so Kate wouldn't wake up, but it felt good to lean on someone besides Kate; she was too close to it, anyway, she couldn't give him much comfort because she needed it too.
He sighed, swallowing the rest of his tears, and he pulled away, looking up at Sara's kind, concerned face. "You should know about Kate, first. She wouldn't want me to tell you, well, maybe she wouldn't care, but back in the real world she was a fugitive. She was on the plane with a US Marshal, being taken stateside to be tried-"
Sara cut him off. "For murder, armed robbery, attempted murder...should I go on?"
Sawyer gazed at her in shock. "What? How did you know?"
She shrugged. "It was all over the news when the plane went down." He shook his head. I'm an idiot. "She's not what they say she is."
Sawyer glanced at her, a sardonic smile crossing his face. "Yes she is, Sara. And don't forget it." He brushed his hands softly through her hair again, loving how it snapped beneath his fingers as his electricity charged it. His voice lowered to almost a whisper. "She's a hard bitch beneath that loving Kate, Sara. Everything they said about her on the news, the things she did...she did. Her reasons are her own, hell, I don't even know them really, but I believe you know that she did have her reasons."
Sara was gazing at the sweetly sleeping Kate, trying to mesh the two together but they didn't fit; if the media was correct then she had done some horrible things and Sara couldn't condone them, no matter how hard she tried, but as she gazed at her and thought about the light, the warmth and goodness Kate had shown her, the love and acceptance, the way she was with Sawyer...she must have had really good reasons. "Yeah. I know she's...good. If she wasn't I...I couldn't care about her."
Sawyer nodded. "Just be warned, Sara. She's ruthless when she has to be." She looked angelic as she slept cradled on his lap; the horrible crushing weight was gone and he couldn't resist kissing her opened mouth, she stirred and mumbled about angels and red and blue birds, then slipped back into sleep. "The first time I saw her she was getting dragged out of a bus station in Iowa. She kicked the shit out of the Marshal arresting her and I fell in love with her right then." He glanced at Sara, who was squatting next to them, still staring at Kate. "That was four years ago. How impossible is it that I would find her again? And like this?"
Sara smiled, using his shoulder to balance herself as she sat down, crosslegged, next to them. "Apparently not too impossible."
Sawyer looked anguished. "What if this isn't real? What if I'm...making this so I can be with her? What if this isn't really even her, just some thing I made to be her?" Terror snapped from his eyes.
Sara put a calming hand on his arm as he began to look a little panicky. "Sawyer, Sawyer, calm down. Look, you love her, right? When you hold her, like you are now, is she real? You can feel her, her heart beat, her breath?" He nodded, the fear in his eyes diminishing. "How much more real do you want it to be?"
He just stared at Kate for a minute, then reached his hand down to her belly and laid it there, feeling the warmth and life inside, his son growing in her. It was real, as real as he could want it. He bowed his head, letting his energy flow into her, gently; she was going to need it. Soon.
Sara watched them sadly for a minute, then she stood and stretched, working the kinks from her already aching muscles. "I wouldn't let her sleep much longer. She's going to be tired no matter what."
He grimaced at the idea of waking her; she was too peaceful, too beautiful; he bent down and kissed her open mouth again and this time she reacted violently, lashing out with her fist before she realized what was happening and Sawyer yelped, "Dammit, Kate!" She clapped her hand to her mouth as she focused; Sawyer was holding his hand over his eye and looking at her reproachfully. "Sorry."
He glanced at Sara, still holding his hand over his smarting and swelling eye. She got him good. "I told you. Ruthless."
Kate stared at them blearily as they both laughed. "What the hell is so funny?" she snapped.
Sara smiled at Sawyer, nodding apologetically. "Oh, yeah, I should have remembered. Tired and cranky." She leaned in and whispered, "No matter what."
Kate was glaring at them both. "Would you mind telling me what's so damn funny?" Her head was aching and her throat was sore from puking, and they were laughing away like nothing was wrong.
Sawyer leaned his head against hers, showing her a glimpse of his already-puffy eye. "You are, Freckles. You are."
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Hanso swiped his card again at the entrance to the medical lab and he ushered Jack and Locke into a small cubicle where there were two sinks and a pile of surgeon's scrubs and masks. "Wash up, Jack, you ought to know the drill." The three of them donned the scrubs and masks after they washed he opened a glass door that led into a small medical ward. Beds lined the walls on both sides and there was a small nursing station and some medical eqipment lying around. There were a few patients in the beds, and as Jack passed one he looked away in horror. He was shrunken, like he had no solid bones to hold him up and he had dissolved into a pile of vaguely human shaped skin. Drool was pooling at the corners of his mouth, or at least what Jack thought might be his mouth, and as he watched in disgust it dribbled out, stringing into his puddled lap.
Hanso was staring at him sadly. "Corrupted. He tessered a few too many times before we realized what it was doing." He sighed, shaking his head. "He's been like this for almost thrity years. Do you believe it? His case is mild. The others died. That's when we began working on the animals, testing the drugs to strengthen us for the journey. The tesseract takes it away, strength, intelligence, life span, ability to communicate," he nodded at the slobbering pile on the bed, "but the drugs gave it back."
Passing by the corrupted man puddled in his bed, they went through another door, this one led to a small clinic, and as Jack watched Hanso went to a large, glassed in cabinet, similar to the one at the Zoo, and he pulled out a small vial with the numbers 481-51623-42 stamped on it. "I've seen that before."
"Have you now? And where would that have been?" He looked mildly interested.
"Kate found it in the drains. And there were some in the hatch. Is it a vaccine?"
Hanso's eyes drifted and he said, "Vaccine. Yes, I guess it is, kind of." He glanced back at Jack, losing the faraway look. "After we saw what the treatments did to the animals we decided that it was time for us to use it on ourselves. We had returned the Foundation to its working order and over the course of a month we injected ourselves with the serum, watching as we grew stronger, faster, smarter, stealthier...we quickly took over the Island and we rounded up the people who were here and told them that it was a vaccine, so that what happened to the people who were bitten didn't happen to them." He grinned. "In reality I was creating an army. The war had almost destroyed us, all of my work, my dream. The Dark was defeated and the Island was adrift; it spoke to me at night, while I lay beneath the stars, and it told me what I had to do to bring it back to power, to bring back it's magic so that it could survive the next war." The faraway look was back but he was staring at Jack as he said, "That's the cycle, you see. It dies and is reborn, over and over. Why? Who knows? It just is. So I used the tesseract to call down another power, and another, and another, and soon we were back on track."
Jack looked around. "So you bring down planes and ships to power the Island and to build an army. Well, where's the army?"
Hanso grinned through his beard. "Everywhere, Jack. And they are Legion." He turned away, picking up a shiny injection gun like the one Sawyer had in his pack. "Seen this before too, I see," he said, noting Jack's look.
Jack nodded. "Desmond had one, in the hatch..." Comprhension dawned in his eyes. "Desmond was one of you?"
Hanso nodded. "Yeah. We knew you were trying to get into the hatch, so we snuck him in to show you how the computer works, get you to stay and do button duty for us." His insane grin widedned. "I told you we were everywhere, Jack." Sticking the tip of the needle-gun into the vial he withdrew a small amount of liquid and thumped the side of the gun, ridding it of trapped air bubbles. "Who wants to go first?"
Jack backed away. "I'm not doing that."
Locke stepped forward. "I will."
Hanso rubbed a swab of alcohol over Locke's arm and hesitated before pulling the trigger. "The transition is...painful, John. In about an hour we'll have to put you in the closed room." He motioned to a barred, padlocked steel door Jack hadn't noticed; there was a tiny glass window near the upper end of the door; it looked like the same 'glass' that was in the hatch door. "So you won't...hurt yourself." He paused, looking Locke in the eyes. "There's no goin' back."
Locke nodded. "Go ahead."
Jack watched with horror and apprehension as Hanso jabbed the needle into Locke's arm, pulling the trigger on the injection gun. John winced, and as Hanso pulled out the needle and covered it with a small piece of gauze he turned to Jack. "Now you."
Jack shook his head. "No." He was afraid of what it would do to him; his mind was still on Ana, no matter how hard he tried to turn it to other things, and he had a feeling that she was in trouble. He did care, he always cared, and God knows he wanted her; something in him was holding him back from wanting her enough. He still had a chance; if the Island had taught him anything, it was that there was always another chance but he was afraid, scared that she was too far gone for him to get back. So he stayed, and thought about her, and loved her. And suffered.
Hanso shrugged, looking at his with sage eyes. "You'll come around. She will too, it's just a matter of time." He winked at Jack, making his skin crawl. "If she lives."
Cold dread struck Jack deep in his stomach. "What do you mean?"
"Nothin'." He grinned. "It's just a dangerous Island. And you did leave her alone out there."
Jack spun around and sprinted for the door; he was going to find her before something happened, he couldn't bear the idea that she would be hurt and it would be his fault. Hanso pulled out a gun and cocked it, shouting just as he reached the swinging door back into the ward. "Stop!"
Jack skidded to a halt, his hand resting on the doors. "You gonna shoot me? Fine. Do it." He stared to push on the door.
"Just another hour, Jack, then I will let you go. I want you to be here when we put Locke in the closed room." He smiled and put the gun back in his pocket. "An hour."
Jack hesitated; an hour could mean anything for Ana, but the Island was still important, without it he could never have her anyway. "Fine. An hour." He came back to them and Locke stood up from his stool, rubbing his arm.
"Tingling. And not pleasantly." He was grimacing a little.
Hanso nodded. "Yes. It's just the beginning, my friend." He looked around the room and said, "We have seen enough here. Maybe a tour of the Math and Numerology department will take your mind off of the pain, for a little while anyway."
Locke nodded, and Jack agreed; the number mystery was about to be solved and he thought briefly about Eko, telling them about the Bible Numerology that night on the beach by the drains. Guilt flickered briefly as he remembered John shooting him down cold in the glade and he swallowed it, concentrating his energy on Ana and finding her as soon as possible. He smiled weakly at Hanso as they walked towards the swinging doors exiting the medical rooms. "Yeah, I've been wondering about some numbers..."
