Genre: Road/Action/Adventure/Romance
Fandom: LOST
Characters: Sun/Jack
Rating: R
So far: After a short-lived rest in Quepos, Jack and Sun are on the road again, heading for the Panama Canal.

But Not Broken
Chapter 4 – And if the Answer is No, Can I Change Your Mind?

Sand and blood – that's all she really remembered about the island. That's what made her furious about the chase and all the people that had been killed for what they supposedly knew. Family was the other thing. They lived together and they died together. There were parts of her, irrational, forgetful parts, that wished they were still back there. It was the only place she and Jin had ever really been happy together.

She sat on the bed, waiting for Jack to return from the hotel lobby, her muscles tight and aching, tense with the fear of being alone. Two days had gone by and they'd kept themselves holed up, hoping Winchester and his men would assume they'd moved on. A safe place was never taken for granted, but it also never stayed safe for every long. Someone would be back for them, and the truth was they probably should have left already – would have, too, if it hadn't been for Jack's injury. Their exhaustion coupled with the first glimmer of hope that came with Locke's message had made their rest heavy and needful – a kind of relief from their burden.

She was always surprised at the things she learned about Jack in these quiet times. Like the way he always rubbed his neck when in deep conversation, a subconscious, nervous act. He had been so strong – stronger than anyone she'd known – but there was still this very vulnerable side to him – a side he was never very good at hiding. It's why they had looked to him as a leader in the first place. It wasn't because he was a doctor, although she had to admit that it helped. It was because he breathed this air of confidence and compassion that so rarely go together. It was something she had seen in Jin when she first met him – before her father broke his spirit. It was something she saw in Jack, too.

In the closet of their small room had been a black dress, left behind by a previous occupant and somehow missed by the cleaning crew. She put it on after he went downstairs. It fit her perfectly and she wore it now, feeling for the first time in a long time like a lady – with shaved legs and exposed knees. She was the fall-back plan. They needed to access a computer so they could identify the location in the coordinates. If he couldn't get to one himself, the plan was for her to distract the front desk clerk, a young man who had taken a liking to her.

This had been the hardest thing to get used to. They had become criminals, in nearly every sense of the word. Despite the life her father lived, she never made allowances for him. He had chosen his life. She never thought about what might have driven him to those decisions. For them, it was a matter of necessity. Do or die, as they say. The motive had never mattered to her before. She hadn't even taken it into account. Now, she had no choice. She was faced with her own, very real motives.

She heard the sound of the latch being unlocked from outside. She knew it was Jack by his familiar footsteps, but still got goose bumps every time a door opened.

"Santa Catalina." He said simply before opening the closet's folding door and kneeling before it, collecting their things. She stood quickly and walked over to him. Something was wrong.

"Jack?" She asked, knowing she didn't want to hear what he had to say, that their stay in Quepos had run its course.

"Peru." This one-word utterance was spoken as though it explained everything. A ha! Peru She thought sarcastically. This all makes perfect sense now.

"Put these on. We're leaving." He handed her some clothes from their pile of clean laundry and stuffed the rest haphazardly into their packs. He didn't look back at her. She kneeled down beside him and placed her hand on his to steady it.

He looked at her then, finding her eyes wide with urgency. He always found these moments difficult. "I was leaving the lobby when I saw two men come in and accost the front desk clerk. They described us to him and gave our names. I was hidden so I stayed and listened. He said he hadn't seen us and they left, but when I approached him after they were gone, he said he could tell they hadn't believed him."

Sun swallowed, closing her eyes slowly and bowed her head. It was stupid, but she'd had this vision of them leaving the hotel, arms hooked together, glancing ever forward, not afraid of what was behind them, like vacationing lovers. It was a simple, happy dream and the memory of it crept into her mind like that broken figurine – so fragile. She never should have played with it in the first place. She suddenly felt foolish in that well-fitting dress that she'd relished only moments before and wanted nothing more than to take it off.

The thought was disrupted by Jack. "We'd better hurry."

Costa Rica had an abundance of two things as far as Jack could tell – shitty paved roads and shitty dirt roads. Even someone used to driving them would find them treacherous. And the rain didn't help a bit. It was impossible to predict how long it would take them to get anywhere. Two days from their hasty escape in Quepos, Jack found that Panama wasn't much different.

When they were on the move, Jack never really thought that much about the precarious holding pattern that they were in with their pursuers – a perpetual game of cat and mouse in which their only chance of escape was moving undetected. Mice are small and can go places that a large hungry feline cannot. The recent days spent in hiding had given him time to digest their newfound autonomy, now that Claire and Aaron were gone and they were just two. Despite the close calls, Jack was certain that they had a better chance now than they had before at evading Winchester and his men. If they played it right, perhaps they could find some hole in the wall, some crack to fall into.

Crossing the border into Panama had been a kind of quiet symbolic victory. They were one step closer to God, whatever Locke had meant by that. But, when they finally reached the canal, he was still uneasy. As far as he could tell, they hadn't been followed. But the truth was that they were always followed, whether it seemed that way or not.

Sun sat up, jolted out of a reverie of her own when Jack parked the car. It was she who spoke first. "Are we stopping for the night?" Neither of them had slept in at least twenty four hours and nightfall was just around the corner. Sun pushed her hair from her eyes and unsuccessfully fought back a yawn.

"I don't think we should cross the bridge." Jack had been thinking about this all day. It was only now that he spoke up.

"You mean across the canal? I don't understand. We have to get to Santa Catalina, Jack. It's our only chance."

He looked at her puzzled face, at the panic that rose within her so much more quickly than it used to. "No, I don't mean that. Look." Jack unfolded the map at his side and Sun leaned in for a look. "Other than the Bridge of the Americas, there's really only two, maybe three other ways of crossing the canal by car. All of the traffic bottlenecks at this point. Chances are they've got somebody waiting for us at every entrance – less of a chance that they don't. It's suicide."

"So what do we do?" Sun asked, still a bit shaky from the rough ride.

"We have to get a boat. This is a major shipping thoroughfare, Sun. Several dozens of cargo ships cross the canal every day, possibly more. They'd never be able to find us. It's an easy way to fall off the radar."

Sun nodded. He was right. "You mean to stow away?"

He drew away from her and began folding the map. "I don't know, Sun." He shook his head and licked his bottom lip, another of his nervous habits. "But I do know that in order to get out of this we've gotta change the game. All of this, until now, has been reactionary. We have to start looking ahead a few moves. Otherwise we're dead."

"Dammit, Jack."

"It's the only smart thing, Sun."

"I know," she said. But that's not exactly what she meant. All of his reassurances came with a hint of doubt. She knew he only said it because it was real. But for once she just wished he could tell her things would be okay - that they were going be fine.

Outside of the car, Sun could hear the muffled music of Latin America. She heard laughter and smelled the unmistakable scent of the grill. The sweltering humidity had subsided and a cool breeze had replaced it. She wanted to laugh. She wanted to eat food and dance and forget about all of this. But her only two options were to either stow away illegally or die. She looked at Jack, his head hung low, his hand running through his short hair. She closed her eyes.

"You looked pretty." The words escaped his lips almost involuntarily.

"What?" She asked, her eyes snapping open to look at him.

"In your dress," he answered quietly. "I wanted to tell you that earlier. But, the timing didn't seem right."

"Oh," she fought back a blush.

"So," he paused. "Let's do this."

"Let's do this."