That night, back at camp, it was common knowledge to the whole camp about the mysterious arrival of the four year old, and who she was. People seemed panicky about the idea of people being turned into children, and demanded answers. Why? When? How? None of these were any Jack could answer for, after all, there was no medical explanation for any of it. It had just happened.

"It was the island." Locke told him aside when Jack had taken Kate away from the group that had met him after they had been to collect some fruit. Kate had seemed almost frightened by the stampede of people who wanted to see if it was true.

"Excuse me?" Jack said, not slowing down his walk, and not turning to look at him. He went over to the campfire where Sayid, Shannon, Claire, Charlie and Aaron sat, as he did every night, and sat down, setting Kate next to him only for her to crawl straight back into his lap, as she always did.

"The island. This has happened for a reason." Locke repeated. Charlie looked at him for a moment and then shook his head to himself, going back to his food and stopping Aaron from eating a rather large bug he had taken an interest in.

"Locke, I know some strange things happen here, but this-" He nodded down to Kate, "-Is more than just the island."

"Do you have a more logical explaination?" Locke asked, sitting down uninvited. Jack was silent.

"Well, what's you idea?" Claire asked.

"Kate was pregnant." Jack held back from congratulating Locke on stating the obvious. "Were you nervous, Jack? Frightened?"

Jack's head snapped up from where he was looking down at Kate protectively. "What?"

"About being a father? You were scared, weren't you?" Locke analysed. "You were scared about not being a good father, not being able to raise a child properly."

Jack frowned. "Now hold on a minute, Locke. You can't just assume that-"

"So you weren't scared then?" Locke interrupted. Jack, again, fell silent and returned his gaze to Kate, who was sitting humming to herself and watching Aaron trying to reclaim his bug. "Everything that has happened here has happened for a reason, Jack. You can't deny that. What if you were so worried about fatherhood that the island changed Kate to prove to you that you could be a good carer for a child?"

Hadn't Kate said that very morning that he was better than her father? Jack considered this for a moment, but said nothing, and Locke walked away. Claire waited to see if anyone else was going to speak first, but no one did.

"You know, Locke might be right." She said hesitantly.

All heads snapped towards her except those of the preoccupied children.

Shannon frowned. "You can't be serious!" Even though it had been a few years since she had lost Boone, she still had trust issues with Locke, which had not improved with time, only deepened the gap between them.

"Think about it, being worried about being a parent is a natural thing." Claire began. "I had it, Thomas had it, even Charlie had it. It's a big change and no one can be fully confident on that. No one else has had the time to adjust to it while being on the island like Kate and Jack, so perhaps this is a way of assuring them that they're going to be all right."

Jack smiled. "I hope you're right with that, Claire."

Charlie smirked. "Trust me, the woman's never wrong." And Claire elbowed him in the ribs lightly, although Charlie dramatically fell backwards and pretended to be fatally wounded.

Unlike the night before, Kate refused to fall asleep, even when Aaron had fallen asleep an hour before. Jack himself was tired, the younger Kate wearing him out in the day more than the regular Kate did, and although Shannon and Claire offered to watch Kate while he went off to bed, Jack shook his head, insisting that he was fine to stay awake with her. There was a long silence afterwards where everyone just sat comfortably, but all of a sudden, Kate snapped her head up from where she had rested in on Jack's shoulder, and she looked behind him.

"What's the matter?" Jack asked, turning with her to see what she was looking at. It was dark, and he couldn't see anything. Kate only frowned, but not at Jack, rather in the direction she was looking in. Her eyes didn't budge from the spot, and she jumped out of Jack's reach quicker then he could get a steady hold on her, and crept over to the edge of the clearing. "Kate?"

Seeing as she was within the light of the campfires still, and she was still in the campsite, only skirting on the edge of the trees, Jack didn't stand up, but he made sure he was in a good position to leap up as soon as he needed to. Kate just stood on the edge of the trees, as if she was waiting for something. She stood there for a few minutes.

"What's she doing?" Shannon asked.

"I don't know." Jack said, getting up, and going over to her. He crouched beside her, putting an arm around her shoulders to steady himself. "What are you looking at, Kate?" He asked her, and she shook her head.

"Nothin'." She answered casually. Then she fell silent again. Jack looked into the darkness, he couldn't see anything either, and was about to stand up, and lead her back to camp when she spoke again. "Can't you hear them?" Kate asked fearfully, scooting right against him, clutching his shirt into her balled up hand.

"Hear what?" Jack asked, concerned with the look of undoubted terror on her face, mixed with curiosity and confusion. Jack strained his ears, but heard nothing.

"Them." She said again.

Jack turned her so that she had her back to the clearing, tearing her eyes away from whatever held her gaze. She stared at him deeply, the look not disappearing as it used to when she looked at him, and this worried Jack. "Kate, what can you hear?" She didn't answer, only leaned forward, holding onto him tightly for comfort. "Kate, come on, sweetie, what did you hear?" He asked. Jack was too concerned to even realise that he had called her 'sweetie', something he had only called her when she was an adult.

She moved so that rather than her head being hidden in his shoulder, she could speak into his ear. Her voice was wavering as she said lowly. "Whispers."