Author's notes: Thanks for the review xlostangelx. There are other Walt stories out there; you can search stories by character name using the "char" buttons near the top right corner. This story is by far the longest, though, and I have every intention of completing it.

I have decided to ignore some, shall we say, significant events going on in Lost currently for the duration of this tale.

A familiar character appears before heavy, continuous storms force the castaways into the caves and cope the best that they can.

Jack and Kate gasped as they recognized Danielle emerging from behind some trees. She was carrying a rifle, but made no attempt to raise it when she saw Kate wielding a gun. Before Jack or Kate could say anything, the French woman laid down her rifle and asked,

"What have you done here?"

Jack was hesitant to say anything, but Kate insisted that they would be better off cooperating. Kate gave a long, detailed description of they blew up the hatch, explored it, and heard a message apparently tapped out by Walt. Then the explosion that injured Locke and terminated any more attempts at communication.

"So the Others took the boy down there," thought Danielle out loud.

"Now wait a minute," demanded Jack. "When you said the Others wanted the boy, you meant Walt, didn't you? We thought you meant Claire's child."

Danielle appeared confused. "If Walt is the boy's name, then yes. There is only one boy on the island?"

"But Claire's baby is a boy, and Claire was kidnapped by Ethan. That's who we thought these Others were after."

"I did not mean to mislead you. I did not know the gender of the baby, so I did not realize you would misunderstand." After a few moments of silence, Danielle announced, "The Others took my baby sixteen years ago. Now they took your boy Walt to this underground place. It is possible they took my Alex there, too."

Jack and Kate were skeptical, but Danielle quickly added, "I will help you. Together we shall find both missing children. What do you need?"

The source of the help offer was dubious, but the offer itself was most welcome. "We need some explosives to blow down a heavy door down there," responded Kate. "And we could use more weapons."

"I have grenades, and can get more firearms," replied Danielle. "I also have plastic explosives, which are much safer than dynamite. We can bring the items here tomorrow; there is not enough daylight today." Danielle looked up at the sky, and did not like what she saw. "If we do not accomplish this by tomorrow, we may have to wait a long time. Monsoon season is upon us."

"All right then," said Kate, taking charge as Jack was still hesitant. We'll meet here tomorrow and go get your supplies, or the first day that it isn't pouring. Jack and Kate returned to the caves, as Danielle went off to her own secret location.

Back on the beach, Michael and Jin were completing the outrigger canoe. They would get help in carrying it to the shore the next day and take it for a test run. They had carved out most of the trunk of a large tree, and chopped away at many branches, making seats and oars out of them, as well as the outrigger portion and connecting pieces of wood. They returned to the caves shortly before sunset in improved spirits. Many castaways expected tomorrow to be a big day.

The next day turned out to be notable, but not in the way the plane crash survivors had hoped. It rained. Hard. All day long. Lightning struck and thunder was heard at regular intervals. The wind was extremely strong, with occasional ferocious gusts. It would have been suicide to venture outside on a day like this. But the next day wasn't any better, nor the next. A full-blown monsoon had struck, and it seemed to have stalled very near the island. Arzt's prediction had come to pass, and the crew was stuck in the caves for the long haul.

For the next month, there were only occasional breaks in the weather, which the islanders used to quickly restore their food supply and clean up the area around the caves. Numerous trees and branches had fallen. Even then those who ventured outside usually wound up soaked. In the face of such adversity the better side of the castaways came through for the most part; a widespread spirit of cooperation toward the goal of continued survival.

Michael, though, became extremely exasperated. There was never a window of opportunity nearly large enough to test his canoe, and there was every chance of it being damaged where it had been secured on the beach. He spent a good deal of his time learning fighting techniques from Sayid. This was Michael's way of making the best of a bad situation. The backgammon set got a good deal of use, mainly from Locke and Hurley. They were both good players, and evenly matched. They noted that neither of them had any outrageous streaks of luck, but thought it best to keep that observation quiet. Of course the person who had been luckiest with that backgammon set had run into extremely bad luck on the ocean and on the far end of the island.

Meanwhile, the penicillin injections had been helping Sawyer. The infection was going away, but his left arm was still pretty useless. He was able to keep from going crazy by reading to Aaron. Sawyer's voice had the most unusual calming effect on Claire's baby. Claire was simultaneously annoyed that she wasn't able to quite her child consistently, and grateful that Sawyer was around to provide this much needed service. On the other hand, this annoyed Charlie no end. He regarded himself as the child's protector, and he deserved the title after having helped retrieve Aaron from Danielle. But nothing he did or said ever seemed to help keep the baby happy. The frustration was getting unbearable. He did have a way of alleviating unpleasant feelings, but he didn't want it to come to that. He eyed the single Virgin Mary statue he had taken from the drug smugglers' plane. Charlie was very well aware of what would be revealed inside it in case it was broken, a single packet of heroin, and that there was a more than adequate supply a few hours away. But he could never get away with such a trek in the constant downpour. He must never let Claire know about his former habit, but would keeping that secret drive him insane?