Chapter 11

Compared to the shitstorm that had come when Kate had been arrested two weeks earlier, the arrival of Walt Lloyd in Seattle went a lot more smoothly. Part of it had to with the fact that after Carole Littleton had survived her surgery and Kate had been arraigned in LA, the majority of the media had either relocated to California to try and follow a showier story or had left the Oceanics for bigger fish. For those who were left, very few would have known who Walt was, and even fewer would've been able to link him with the nearly teenage boy who showed up in Seattle Grace under the name Peter Michaels.

Jack, at least, was grateful for this relief. Walt had been through even more shit than most of the survivors. The last thing any of them was another media circus until they could figure out a way to help him and his father. For now, no one seemed to notice, and most of the staff at Seattle Grace took him at his word that Peter Michaels was just an acquaintance of Hurley's from before the crash.

The harder part was figuring out what they were going to do about Michael. Apparently, when he had told his mother what had actually happened to them, and by extension the rest of the Oceanics, on the island (fudging over Michael's darkest hours for the moment), her main concern had been trying to figure out why nobody had come to talk to them before now.

"I spent the better part of a year trying to track them down, Mrs. Dawson," Hurley had reminded her. "It wasn't like I had an address for them. Not a lot of paper on the island."

Mrs. Dawson had acknowledged as much, and had admitted that this explained at least some of why her grandson had been having such a hard time readjusting. "But how exactly do you plan to help him now? How does moving him across the country make his life better?"

This time Sawyer had done much of the talking. "A lot of bad shit happened when were stranded, and what helped us get through it was being around each other. I was never much of a people person before, but being around my friends has kinda helped me deal with a lot of shit in my life. And I was a lot more messed up than either your son or your grandson were."

"We're not saying we're going to take them out of your life, Mrs. Dawson," Hurley had assured her. "In fact, if you want to come with us to Seattle, we'd be more than willing to buy another ticket. It has nothing to do with money. We just want to help our friends."

Mrs. Dawson considered this, then looked at her son, who'd been remarkably quiet. "When Susan took Walt away, I know how hard it was for you to give him up. I know that you didn't want to give up without a fight, and I know that you've been suffering for it ever since. I could never understand why you lied to me for all that time. Now that I know the truth, I almost wish you'd kept lying."

"It was an ugly time, Ma," Michael apparently didn't trust himself to say anything else.

"When I heard your plane disappeared, I thought I had lost you forever. Ever since you came back, I've been feeling like I keep losing you. Both of you." Mrs. Dawson shook her head. "I know you keep saying this is for the best, but I feel like I'm about to lose you again."

Hurley and Sawyer had reassured Mrs. Dawson that this wasn't going to happen. Even so, Jack had wished he had been a part of the conversation. Enough time had gone by that he wasn't sure whether he wanted to see Michael punished for what he had done, and he was pretty sure most of the rest felt the same way. It was going to depend quite a bit on what Walt wanted, and honestly, he wasn't sure how the pre-teen was dealing with everything right now.

. Which had been part of the reason that he was waiting outside the young man's room right now. Skoda had just finished his session with him, and he wanted to see if he could talk to him.

To be perfectly honest, he wasn't a hundred percent sure what he was going to say to Walt. He had never had much of a relationship with him on the island, and except for a few fleeting glances, he'd barely spoken with him since the rest of them had brought him back. He wasn't qualified to discuss things with an ordinary child, much less one that Juliet had said was psychic. All he knew for sure was that he'd be better off just being honest with him.

As he entered the room, Walt fixed him with a stare that he had sometimes met people with when he was on the island. Jack hoped like hell he wasn't going to do anything to piss him off - according to Juliet, that was when the strange things were most likely to happen.

"I guess the absolutely worst thing that I could ask you right now is how are you doing," Jack began.

"I've been better," Walt admitted. "But to tell you the truth, Jack, I've also been a lot worse."

"Yeah," Jack thought for a moment. "I'm sorry that we arranged this. For the last couple of years, you must be really sick of going from one small room to another. "

"It's not that bad." Walt told him. "At least more people have been coming to visit me then in Bellevue. Claire even brought Aaron a few hours ago. "

Jack hadn't decided to tell him yet about his and Claire's relationship. Given what he'd been told, Walt had a clearest idea about it when he made physical contact with somebody. He decided just to wait and see what would happen. "Has your father been in to see you yet?"

The hopeful expression on Walt's face died. "What are you going to do to my dad?" he demanded.

That's what he picked up when he touched somebody, Jack thought. Not even Hurley would dare to blab about what they were thinking about yet. Well, they weren't going to get anywhere by lying now. "None of us have decided yet," he admitted. "Most of us don't want to do anything that would end up hurting you any more than we have to. But Hurley, you know, he has a reason for seeing things differently."

The moment he said this, he wished he could have taken it back. He didn't know if anybody had told or even if they should have told Walt what exactly his father had done on the island to get him free. Whatever the case, it should never have come from him.

And then Walt shocked him. "He already told me." he said slowly. "On our way back to civilization. That's why I didn't want to see him for so long."

Shit. That explained a lot. Especially why Walt had been so reluctant to even talk about his father until recently. "I'm sorry," came out of Jack's mouth.

"For what? None of this is your fault."

"Not for that. For the island. Everybody kept looking to me to try and make all the decisions," Jack told him. "And all that time you were gone, I couldn't come up with a real concrete idea to save you from them. If I'd done anything sensibly, maybe your dad wouldn't have gotten so desperate."

"The Others manipulated him, too. Besides, he could've come to you instead of taking it all on himself." Walt seemed a little more relaxed then before.

"I think that everybody did that a bit too much on the island. It may have been the one thing we all had common besides being stuck together."

They actually managed to share a smile at this. "I went to Bellevue, because I was messed up, and because there was no one I could talk to about this." Now Walt frowned a little. "I'm actually a little surprised it took you guys so long to reach out."

"We've all been dealing with our own shit," Jack looked at him. "Hopefully, that's over now, and we can concentrate on helping each other. That includes you and your father."

"You're not going to punish him?" Walt asked so casually Jack actually needed a few moments to realize that he'd heard right.

The question had come so easily Jack figured he was entitled to a direct answer. "There's some debate about that. On the one hand, whatever reason, Michael did kill two people. No law on this earth can effectively punish him for that, not without causing a shitload of trouble. On the other, their families already know that they're dead. Your father's done a very good job of punishing himself the last year and a half There comes a point where anything else just seems like revenge. Eye for an eye... that's pretty much how the Others did things."

Walt looked at him. "You still haven't answered my question."

"That's basically because we haven't answered it yet." Jack told him. "What I can tell you is, as much as we tried to do things on the island, we never had a democracy. And as leadership goes, I did a pretty crappy job of it. Besides, it's not like we ever did a particularly good job of coming up with a realistic way of punishing people. I can promise you, whatever we decide, we won't keep you in the dark." He looked at Walt "It's not like we could really hide it from you if you wanted to know."

"I don't know if this counts for anything," Walt said slowly. "But I've had a lot of time to think over the past year. I finally managed to understand what he went through. And I think I can finally forgive him."

Walt had much more reason to bear his father animosity than just about anybody else from the crash. This did carry a lot of weight, at least with Jack. The question was, would it mean the same thing to everybody else who came back?

It had taken a fair amount of debate to figure out what to do next. The idea of having a trial, which Hurley had been pushing for, didn't make much sense, considering most of the people who would've been witnesses would have to be on the jury. Nor would it have been easy for anybody to be on that jury to be truly impartial, considering what Michael had done had been the equivalent of a betrayal to the entire group.

Finally, Sayid had hit upon the idea that might be the most rational: the format would be the equivalent of a military tribunal. Three people who seemed the most capable of being impartial would sit on it: Sayid, who had been responsible for more deaths than he had wanted to give credit for being; Juliet, who had been an Other, and who had known what they were capable of, and Claire, who was a parent, and who had the most interaction with the Others before they had taken Walt. (Under other circumstances, they would've asked Kate to be the potential swing vote, but her incarceration made this impossible.)

The rest of them would serve as witnesses either for or against Michael. Hurley, who had the most reason to be angry with him, was very reluctant to try and play prosecutor, considering his total legal experience came from watching reruns of Law and Order on USA. But his relationship with everybody on the island, meant that mostly he could be impartial. Jack said that he would be more than willing to defend Michael, considering his previous position.

Michael had been surprisingly willing to go along with all this, considering everything that he had been through the last year. His major question had been something of the sticking point. "What are you going to do if you find me guilty?"

"There's going to have to be some kind of punishment," Jack admitted. "Nothing violent, and nothing fatal. What we'd have in mind is something that's fair. I don't honestly know what could be worse than anything we've gone through ever since the plane crash, but for once I'm going to leave it in the hands of someone who isn't me."

They decided to go to one of the hotel rooms that they had been staying in ever since they had all gotten to Seattle. Hurley had given one of the bellhops a fairly considerable tip to let them know if there was any sign of the media showing up.

"You're going to get your day in court," he told Michael, "and right now the only public opinion that matters is ours." Then negating the sternness, "God, I do sound a little like Sam Waterston."

The proceeding ( even given everything that had happened, Jack couldn't bring himself to call it a trial) began the next day. Considering how fun-loving and carefree Hurley had been on the island, it was hard to imagine just how solemn he was in his opening statement. He made it very clear that he had always trusted Michael, that he had supported him and his son throughout their time on the island, and that as a reward for their trust, he had killed two innocent people (he'd had to swallow when he mentioned Libby) and then betrayed them to save his son. Even though they'd all been rescued in the end, they still needed to serve some kind of justice. He admitted that Michael had suffered, but that didn't count towards what he had done to other people. That was what the tribunal had to consider when it came time to follow their oaths.

Jack had been many things in his life, and he knew that he'd failed at a lot of them, but he'd never been much of a legal scholar. Nevertheless, he decided the best way to argue Michael's case was to try it from his point of view.

"When we ended up on the island, my first instinct was to try and fix everything. From that moment on, everybody looked on me to be everything - the doctor, the leader, the one who made all the important decisions. And whatever major decision I made for the group, it was always questioned and debated by everybody else. I had a hard job. Arguably the most difficult one on the island. And despite the fact that we were saved in the end, everyone knows I handled everything badly."

He looked at his client. "All that said, I would never for a minute have considered trading positions with Michael. Michael hadn't seen his son almost since he was born. And less than a week after he flew down to Sydney to meet him again, he was a plane crash that could've killed them both. In the early days, he did everything he could to protect his son. When it became clear that rescue wasn't coming, I told everybody that we had to dig in. He was the one who made the first, and then the second major effort to rescue us. He put his and Walt's life on the line to save us. And as a reward for that effort, his son was abducted right from under his nose, and he nearly drowned, barely surviving a shark attack and imprisonment. He then spent nearly a week trying to get back to us. Then the Others manipulated him in order to take him prisoner because they wanted more information on his son. And after being held hostage for nearly a week, he was told that the only way to save Walt was to follow a series of orders." He managed to look right at Juliet when he said those last words. She never blinked.

"No one is saying that Michael's actions weren't wrong. He himself doesn't believe they were right. What I'm asking of this tribunal is whether or not his actions were justifiable. And since we all spent are time on the island with these same people, we know that they were capable of things far worse than what Michael did. And let's be honest. None of us who were on the island can truly say that our hands are completely clean. Did Michael do the ethical thing? Probably not. But considering what his situation was, could any of us have done the same thing?"

It was a potent argument. And he might be able to see Sayid going along with it. He wasn't, however, sure that the women would've thought otherwise. He wondered if it would've made more sense to have Desmond on the tribunal instead of Claire - since he'd had almost no interaction with the Others and had never met Michael at all, he probably would've been the closest to being impartial. But Penny was eight months pregnant, and he had no intention of leaving his wives side for that. It would depend on what kind of case Hurley was going to present.

Since trying to present witnesses to be completely in the traditional courtroom setting would've been difficult, considering everybody had almost been witness to the same events, Sayid and the others decided to try a more impartial system. Each of the survivors would be questioned by Hurley and Jack in no particular order. There would be one exception - Walt, who Jack intended to call for the defense. The judges would then be free to ask any questions they thought about something that they didn't think was clear. After all of them had been questioned, each of them would make a closing argument, and the tribunal would then deliberate. Hurley had been a little puzzled by this procedure, but figured in the end it was closer to fair. He knew he wasn't going to be able to testify, and his testimony would probably be the most emotional and damning. But he was determined to try and see this through the right way. "It's what Libby would've wanted."

The first person to speak was Sawyer. It was hard to tell which side would be more effective. Hurley focused the majority of his questions on what had happened after Michael had been returned to the survivors. Sawyer had been a pretty devastating witness, explaining how Michael had managed to manipulate them into going across the island only with the people the Others had wanted, how they had learned that Michael had betrayed them after killing two of them, and finding out the depths of his deception when he had led them to another station before taking Walt and the boat.

Jack had then handled the questioning. "How did you get along with Michael before the boat was built?" was his first cross.

"Not that well. But then, my charming personality probably didn't help."

"The night the Others destroyed the raft and took Walt, how did Michael handle it?"

Now Sawyer seemed a little more sympathetic. "He kept screaming the kid's name out. Even when it was clear there was no way anyone could hear him."

"After the raft was destroyed, and you encountered the tail section survivors, you began to fall ill. An infection in your shoulder."

"There a question?"

"How did Michael treat you?"

"He made sure we walked slow enough so that I could keep up. And when things got worse, he helped build a stretcher so that everybody could carry me."

"And its a good thing he did. You were pretty close to dead by the time you got back to our camp. Now, when Michael attacked me and Locke, and when we started chasing after him, you joined the search party. Even though, you were just a few days recovered."

"It didn't have to do with Mike." It was the first time that Sawyer had admitted he gone after them with vengeance in his heart.

"But that was the reason you gave for coming. And I seriously doubt you would've come if I'd just asked. One last thing, after all that time you spent building the raft, did you get the impression that Michael would do anything to protect his son?"

"That's the one thing that I am sure he would do."

The next witness was Jin. Sun had offered to translate any questions that he didn't understand, but everyone knew that by this point, Jin was fluent enough. He told them that he had gotten into a fight with Michael in the first week that they were on the island over a misunderstanding, and that they had been very hostile for much of the next few weeks, until he learned his wife's secret, and had started to build the second boat to get off the island. He told him how they had started to form a friendship until the boat had been blown up, and that bond had gotten stronger over the days ahead. He told them that he had taken the sailboat around the island to try and protect Michael, only to learn later that he had escaped without even saying goodbye.

Jack had kept his questions short and to the point. "When you were on the island, you didn't know any English at all?"

"That's right."

"You and Sun pretty much kept to yourself the first month we were on there. Then you learned Sun's secrets, and that was a major betrayal. Correct?"

"Like, how is this relevant?" Hurley objected.

"I have a point. And I think given that I've never done this before I should be granted a little leeway."

"A little quicker, Jack."

"For the next couple of weeks, you and Michael began to form a relationship, even though neither one of you could understand the other. And you kept this friendship up through the raft's launching, the encounter with the Others and being abducted and imprisoned by the tail section. In fact, when Michael ran off to try and find Walt, you and Mr. Eko ran after him in order to try and protect him." Jack hesitated. "It seems that this was a fairly close friendship for both of you."

"Michael was one of my closest friends." Nobody could've missed the sorrow or the fact that Jin had used the past tense in that sentence.

"When Michael ran off, you wanted to join the search party, but Sun talked you out of it."

Jin considered this for a moment. "She was right to make me stay."

"You didn't learn about what Michael had done until about a week after it had happened. " Jack paused. "Knowing everything that you do now, does that change your feelings at all about what Michael did?"

"He should've been able to talk to us about it. We would've understood."

"One last thing. In the time since this trial, you became a father. Can you honestly say that in a similar situation, you wouldn't do anything to protect Ji Yeon?"

"Perhaps." Jin paused. "But I would've talked to her mother first."

That certainly didn't help.

Both of them questioned Sun, but neither Hurley nor Jack was able to get much of merit from it. Sun had revealed her secret to Michael before anybody else, and it was clear that she had trusted him, but it was hard to tell if that had made the sense of betrayal worse. It was clear that what he had done had hurt, but it hadn't been any more direct that some of the other actions that the rest of the group had taken against her, particularly considering some of the things that Sawyer had done.

A few other survivors had given their impressions, and Kate had made a statement that she had asked to be read into the record, but Jack just couldn't tell if either side had an advantage. It seemed like it was going to come down to whatever Walt ended up saying.

Jack began. "Walt, before the plane crash, did you have any memory of your father?"

"My mother moved away after I was born. I understand that he gave full custody to her."

"So when the crash happened, you had known him less than a few days?"

"That's right."

"When we started pulling people out of the wreckage, did you know where your father was at first?"

Walt nodded. "I could hear him screaming for me."

"How would you describe your relationship with your father in the first few weeks on the island?"

"It wasn't very good. He kept pulling me away from people that he thought were dangerous. He wouldn't let me make up my own mind."

"Would you say he was trying to protect you from what we all knew was a dangerous environment? Like any father would?"

Walt took a while before saying: "I guess so." Not the most ringing endorsement.

"Then he starting building a raft to get you off the island, and hopefully everybody else rescued. The night you set sail, the Others abducted you." This was going to be a risk. None of them knew what was coming next. Probably not even Juliet. "Please tell us what happened over the next two weeks."

Walt took a deep breath. "It was a nightmare. After they took me, they put a bag over my head, and we rode off. I never did find out for how long, or where exactly we went. When I regained consciousness, a group of people surrounded me. I never did find out who most of their names were. Except for this black woman named Miss Klugh. She was the one who seemed to be in charge. She told me how glad she was to see me, and that she knew I was special."

Jack wondered if he should press this point, then decided that it would be better to let Walt speak for himself.

"They started by taking samples of my blood and injecting me with stuff, and they kept asking me questions. At first, I didn't want to tell them anything, and for awhile, I refused to eat or answer their questions." Now Walt seemed uncomfortable. "That's when things started getting strange."

"What happened?"

"I kept trying to get a picture of my dad in my head. But for some reason, I couldn't. So I tried to get a picture of Vincent." Walt actually looked embarrassed. "Maybe I was thinking he could lead you guys to me."

That was a strange thought, but then again, Vincent had always been a very perceptive animal.

"Anyway, it didn't work. I would see him for like, flashes, for like a few seconds, but every time I tried to talk to him, my mouth felt like it was filled with cotton. Maybe it was whatever they were trying to drug me with." The fact that Walt was rationally trying to discuss teleportation should've been the oddest thing they were discussing yet, but it now seemed almost comprehensible. "But they seemed to know about it, somehow. They would yell at me and kept saying that bad things would happen if I kept being bad."

The Others had very weird definitions of what was considered 'bad', Jack remembered.

"Finally, after I'd done this like three or four times, they grabbed me, and locked me in a room." Walt had been a trooper up until now, but this was clearly a painful memory.

"Take your time."

"They hooked me up to this IV bag, and made me watch this weird movie. But it wasn't like anything I'd ever seen before. They would show a lot of images real quick, but I couldn't focus on any. Every now and then, I'd see a message, like 'We are the causes of our own suffering' or 'God loves you like he did Jacob.'

"Do you have any idea how long this went on for?"

"It seemed like forever. I completely lost track of time. Every once in awhile, a couple of them would come in, and ask if I'd be willing to talk. I kept telling them no, and they'd start the movie again. But after awhile, they'd come in less and less frequently. One or two would leave food, but after awhile, not even Miss Klugh would come in to see me."

Sawyer turned to Jack, and mouthed two word: Room 23. Jack nodded. He'd never paid a visit to the chamber on Hydra Island that the Others seemed to have to turned into their own private torture chamber, but he and Kate had given some rather detailed descriptions of what they had seen more they had escaped that particular realm of the Others.

"Eventually, they took me out of the room, put another bag over my head, and drugged me. When I woke up this time, we were somewhere else. A little village made up of huts. I don't know how long I was out this time, but something big had changed. "

"What exactly?"

"They would come in to make sure I got fed, and every so often, they would ask me a couple of questions, but they didn't seem as interested in the answers any more. They would always come in three or four at a time, and one of them would always be carrying a gun."

"Walt, at any time, were you ever allowed access to any communication, like a computer?"

Considering what they were talking about, it was a little bizarre that this particular question got a weird look from Walt. "Of course not. They got scared when all I was trying to do was get pictures in my head. I didn't even see a computer the whole time I was on the island."

Jack knew this, but he thought it was important that this particular point - that the Others had tricked Michael in to his trek across the island - needed to be made clear for the tribunal. "Go on."

"I don't know how long this went on, but about a week before we left, they brought me into see my dad. " He looked at Michael for the first time. "I don't know what they had done to get him, but they only let me see him for three minutes. They told me to say that I was all right, but I told him that they were liars, and not to believe a word they said. "

"In the brief time that you saw him, how did your father look?"

Walt considered this. "He looked like he was even worse off than I'd been."

"Did you ever get a chance to explain to your father what they had done to you?"

"I didn't have to. He told me that all he wanted to do was save me."

Jack decided to let that be his last question.

Hurley got up slowly. It was clear that he didn't relish this particular part of what came next. "I only have a few questions," he said slowly. "When did your father tell you what he did to Ana Lucia and Libby?"

"On our way back to the mainland."

"How did you react to learning this?"

Walt hesitated. "I was upset."

"In fact, you told your dad that you never wanted to see him again." Hurley said slowly. "Even after everything he had done to save you."

"I was angry. He put the deaths of two people I never saw on me."

"And you held on to that anger for more than a year. Because it was something truly unforgivable."

"He did what he thought was right."

"Let me ask you something, Walt. Can you look us in the eyes", and now for the first time in the course of the trial, Hurley began to crack a little "and tell us that what your father did was the only option he had?"

Walt had been a good soldier in recounting most of the horrible treatment that he had endured on the island, but having to deal with this was clearly a blow that he was not prepared to deal with. "I - I don't know," he stammered. "I wish that there had been another way."

Hurley probably could have pressed Walt a bit harder and maybe gotten a reaction that could have won the case for his side, but it just wasn't in his nature to be that angry. "It's okay, dude. I don't have anything more to ask you."

Walt was the last witness. Jack had considered putting Michael on the stand to try and defend his actions - after all, he had been held prisoners by the Others for quite some time, and that had affected what he had done - but ultimately, he thought that it was a high-risk, low reward situation. They knew what had happened, they all knew he had lied, and even if the shooting of Libby had been accidental, he had killed Ana with malice of forethought. That could only make whatever decision the tribunal would make even worse.

Instead, they went into closing arguments. This time, Jack went first. His argument didn't take as long to make as his opening had. He told them that they had known what the Others were capable of before they had heard Walt's testimony. That given all the abuse and desperation that had been behind what Michael had been through that he had been pushed to his limit. That he had done what he done not because he was as cold-blooded and ruthless as his captors had been, but because he had been pushed to his breaking point, and then several feet beyond it. It was wrong, but it was not unjustifiable.

Hurley's closing, however, was a lot more intense. "The island was a strange place. None of us can deny that. I don't think any of us will ever fully understand what was going on there. But the reason that all of us came away from it better of was because of who we met, and who we talked to. We trusted each other. " He looked at the defense table. "Michael violated that trust. Worse, he put his own interest above the groups He could've told us he was communicating with Walt. He didn't. He could've taken one of us out on his trek for safety. He chose not to. When he came back to the hatch, he told a lie about what he had seen. And then, in order to save his son, he killed two innocent people, and liberated the leader of the Others, a man who had been responsible for all the horrible things that happened on the island. He tricked four people - including me - on a trek across the island that could've gotten us all killed. And he sold us all out, so that he and his son could leave the rest of us behind."

Jack had never heard Hurley sound so angry in all the time he'd known him.

"The defense will tell you that Michael was manipulated by the Others as well. He's right. But that only goes so far, and it certainly doesn't excuse the level which he went to, or his actions afterward. The defense will tell you that Michael had suffered a great deal since he has returned to the real world. He probably has. But suffering is not the same thing as answering for what he has done. What happened on the island may have been under different circumstances than what happened in the real world, but in the real world, when someone kills another person, he must answer for it. The law that exists here may not be able to do anything. Which is why its up to us. The only way we can answer what has happened is by making Michael pay for it."

Hurley walked back to his table. For someone who had never been within shouting distance of college, he had done a masterful job. Jack was almost convinced by his summation.

Sayid thanked both of them for their time, and said that they would try to have a decision as quickly as possible.

No one knew quite what to do next. This was often the part in all the legal dramas they had seen where the two sides tried to negotiate a deal of some kind. But neither Jack nor Hurley thought that they could've done that because neither of them knew what kind of punishment would fit the crime.

None of them were sure what kind of punishment the tribunal would try to come up with. What kind of sentence could they hand down? How would they be able to make sure Michael could serve it? There were only two real options available that they could carry out: acquittal or death. And nobody thought that even Sayid would be able to cold-bloodedly execute a man he'd known for nearly two months, with the full knowledge of his son learning of the punishment..(Of course, none of them knew exactly what he'd done in the Republican Guard.) Was that the reason Sayid had asked to serve on this tribunal?

Perhaps the decision could've been made if Walt had been more willing to offer some guidance. But even though they had spent a fair amount of time in the room together, Walt still seemed unwilling to make a move towards his father. It was clear from his expression that his testimony had been an ordeal, but even knowing all this, it was obvious that there was still a lot of bitterness on his part for having to bear that burden on top of everything else that he'd gone through.

Jack would've been more than willing to make some kind of arrangement - something to end this enormous tension. But he had no idea of what, and he didn't think Hurley would've gone along with it in any event. He wasn't sure what Hugo would do if the verdict turned against him - as easy-going as he was, he had been incredibly inflexible when it came to this. Considering what was involved, Jack didn't think he could blame him; besides, he was the last person who could give a lecture when it came to stubbornness.

He wasn't sure how long the tribunal would deliberate before making a decision. In one sense, they would need to think about it for awhile. In another, they had had over a year to consider it. If anything, some of them had had more time then others.

So it was somehow shocking and not really a surprise at all that Juliet called them later that day, and told them that the tribunal had reached a decision.

It was impossible to read what the tribunal was thinking when they came in: Sayid had always been stoic, and Juliet had a great poker face. Everybody was clearly trying to see what Claire thought, as she had by far been the most honest person on the island, but she managed to keep her face perfectly blank. Jack wondered, perhaps too late, if it had been wrong to have her do this, so soon after so much had already been heaped upon her.

Sayid looked at the others, before opening with a surprising statement. "Is there anyway this situation can be resolved between both sides? Jack?"

Jack blinked, then answered. "I don't think so."

"Hurley?" Claire this time.

Hurley had always had trouble refusing Claire - Charlie was always there between them. But this time, he stood firm. "I'm sorry. I wish I could, but I think you guys have to."

"Will you accept whatever we decision we have reached?"

Jack knew that something bad could still come of all this, but he was determined not to give up. He looked at Michael, just to be sure, before he nodded.

"Hurley?"

Hurley took a much longer pause. He looked at Michael, then Walt, then Jack. Finally, he faced his friends. "I believe you'll make the right decision."

Sayid's face actually seemed to soften for a moment before returning to perfect blankness. Once again Jack was relieved that he didn't have to make this decision - he would never have managed to be as impartial and as fair as his friends could. Then again, maybe he was overestimating his friends - and his sister.

"This has not been an easy decision for us to make," Sayid began. "It is difficult to deliver impartial justice when dealing with complete strangers; it's even harder to do it with a person you know, and at one point, may have considered to be a friend. Nevertheless, we are probably the people who can best determine whether or not Michael deserves to be punished for his actions."

"The Others may have claimed to be the good guys. It's possible they even were. Not even the woman who spent three years working with them can say with certainty. They visited great pain upon us the three months we were on the island, and we visited just as much pain on them. But the fact remains, all of the torture they meted out upon the island was especially traumatic on all of us. And one of the things we can agree on is that no one suffered more, directly or indirectly, then Michael. That did play a critical role in our decision."

"Now admittedly, there is very little that can excuse taking the life of another human being, let alone two. But the fact is , with only a couple of exceptions, none of us left the island without some blood on our hands. We had reasonable cause, some might say, but that doesn't make those people any less dead." His eyes didn't seem to quite match up with what he was saying for a moment. Jack suspected he was thinking about Shannon. He was thinking about the marshal. "His reasons for doing it may have been better, but that doesn't change the fact that, unlike most of people who ended up dead, he knew the people he killed, and lied about it afterward."

"So, as much as we would like to be reasonable, we decided, by a vote of 2-1, that Michael is responsible for the deaths of two people, and must therefore beheld accountable." Sayid held up a hand. "However, once we determine that, the far more difficult decision comes in regard to sentencing. Death, we all agreed would be far too draconian to deliver to him. And considering that we all escaped a tropical prison, sending him to a more fitting one would be unfair. However, after some discussion, we have thought of a sentence that we think would be more fitting."

Sayid looked across at Jack's side of the table. "Michael Dawson, we hereby sentence you to three years of banishment. During that period of time, you shall not approach any of us or your son. If at any time you violate this admonition, an additional six months shall be added to your sentence. Given that you spent essentially the past year and a half obeying that directive, we shall allow that to account for time served. The final sentence has been handed down as eighteen months."

Sayid looked at Michael, and his expression softened. "It is the understanding of this tribunal that you made several attempts on your life in the interval between returning to New York, and meeting us again. It is our unanimous plea - and hopefully, the decision of everybody connected with the crash of our plane - that you don't take this sentence as an excuse to try again. Life is a precious thing. That was made enormously clear on the island, and fairly recently to the rest of us. The world is a sadder place without Ana Lucia or Libby in it. It would be far sadder if you were to leave it as well."

"A period of no more than one week will be given before you are to begin serving your sentence. We hope that you use this time to find a way for the process of healing to begin. For all our sakes." He looked at him. "The affairs of this tribunal are concluded. "

Jack's first concern was for his friend. Michael seemed to take the decision of being cast out a lot better than he would. Maybe it was because he'd already spent the last year and a half being banished from his friends. Or maybe it was just because the pressure that had been on top of him ever since he had shot both women had finally been resolved.

As always, his greatest concern was for his son. Walt had been quiet ever giving his testimony, earlier that day. But after the verdict, he walked up to his father, and said something that none of them, not even Michael would've expected to hear. "I forgive you, Dad."

All of the effort that Michael had managed to maintain keeping his facade together throughout the trial, collapsed with those four words. "I'm sorry, Walt. I'm sorry I told you everything. I'm sorry I let you go."

"It wasn't your fault. Haven't you figured that out by now?"

Michael's sobs shook his body for a long time. "I just wanted to make sure you'll be taken care of. I just want you to be okay."

"He will be."

Everybody looked up at the source of that voice in surprise. Hurley was standing above him.

"I promised your mom that your kid would be okay. And I'm going to keep my word."

"You're okay with all this?" Jack hadn't been sure how Hurley was going to take all this.

"I'm not like, thrilled. But the decision was fair. And now that it's been given out, I'm more than willing to try and find a way to forgive you."

Michael looked at Hurley. "Do you think you can?"

"Not now. But in a year and a half, maybe." Hurley turned to Walt. "And in any case, your son shouldn't have to keep paying for his fathers mistakes.

Michael seemed hopeful for the first time Jack had seen him. "Have you figured out how to let the world know how my son came back from the dead?"

Hurley nodded. "We've been working on a way to figure it out for the last few days. Hopefully, by the time you - have to leave, we'll finally be able to put it into operation. Don't worry, Walt'll be taken care of"

Michael looked at the only person who Hurley had ever hated. "I am sorry. For everything. All of it. You have to know that, Hugo."

"I do now, Mike. Maybe some day - hopefully some day soon - it'll be enough."