Chapter 4

Present day....

The light was always the first thing he saw....

Shimmering against his closed eyelids, the blast of light against his eyelids stirred him to life. The green grass beneath him was warm from the heat of the sun soaking against it, and the sweet smell of fresh air gently caressed against his body as the wind pressed over him. If not for the pounding headache and taste of coppery blood in his mouth, he would have thought he'd awoken in heaven.

He opened his eyes, the bright sun stabbing against his pale eyes and he quickly closed them again. He wondered for a moment how long he'd been out. The last moments of hurried excitement still banging around his head and he struggled to piece together where he was. Suddenly, his memory came racing back of the smoke...

He jerked up, every sore muscle in his body sharply voicing their dislike of being used so quickly and forcefully. In front him, the concrete pylon stood like a testament of modern man among the natural setting surrounding it. Pain ruptured in his brain, remembering the piercing sound that felt like it was still echoing around his head, and his eyes gazed across the horizon for that great big 'storm cloud' that was chasing him. He saw nothing but green, and closed his eyes. He rubbed his forehead, trying to force some of the pain away.

"Do you love her?" Her voice asked innocently and utterly calm.

Jacen flicked his eyes open, gazing between his fingers. Yeah, he was clearly insane. Worse yet, maybe he was in a coma and this was some dream or nightmare. Maybe the monster cloud had eaten him or whatever it does to its victims... Because somehow, a dead woman stood in front of him. He knew she was dead, he watched her get shot three years ago. The scariest realization was that the bullet hole was still between her eyebrows.

The tall, blonde haired woman stood on the opposite side of the invisible fence. She was calmly stationed a foot from it, her tall, wiry frame standing there on its own power. She had the same clothes on, the same dark skirt and white blouse. Her hair was pulled back in the same ponytail she had worn the last day she was alive. He remembered her quite well.

"Wha.... How are you... ?" Jacen muttered back, trying to get his feet under him to stand but his coordination was still misfiring in his head and he stumbled.

"Do you love Veronica?" She asked, pulling her hands behind her and clasping them together.

Jacen struggled with his feet until finally firmly planting them and shakily raising himself up. He was still weak, struggling to stand to his full height. He could only muster himself to a position leaning forward, leveraging himself against his knees with his hands.

"I.... What?" He asked again, still stupefied.

"She trusts you, finds comfort in you." The dead woman said calmly, eerily stabile. Her blue eyes kept locked onto him, "Are you going to hurt her?"

"Wha... No..... I'm not going to." He said, taking a deep breath and forcing himself to his full height.

"You hurt me...." She answered without flinching, without blinking.

"I...." Jacen started to say, and then noticed from the bullet hole in her forehead, a drop of blood slowly dripped down between her eyebrows and slid down her nose. He struggled to say, "I... You don't understand..."

"Are you sorry you hurt me?" She asked.

"Wha...."

"Are you sorry you took my life?" She asked.

He stared at her, wondering what was going on. He wondered if this was some coma nightmare, and his conscience was leading him toward a fear that he'd been running from his entire life.

"I don't understand what you want.... Why are you here?! Who are you?!" He cried out.

"You know who I am, Jacen." Her voice was exactly as it was in his memory, sending shivers down his spine.

She was right, he did recognize her. He knew it wasn't real, though. This couldn't be real. He argued, "You're dead..."

"Yes...." She answered, as if it were obvious.

"You're... You're thousands of miles away... Your body is six feet under dirt! I watched them bury you!" He retorted, anger welling in chest.

"You can't be here, you're not real!!" He screamed, turning away and looking around behind him. There was the edge of the jungle a hundred feet away, and took a step in that direction.

"You can't run from me... My face is with you everywhere you go...." She said, and in his heart, he knew the truth in that. He turned back around and faced her.

She stepped forward dangerously close to the fence, her face lowering down and her eyes set in a scowl under her bloodied brow. Her deep blue eyes swirled with darkness inside of them, "I'm the face you see on the darkest of nights.... I'm the face that resides in your deepest fears..."

"I..." He started to argue, but couldn't. She was at the core of everything he was running from, everything he tried to leave behind. She was the part of himself that he hated, but couldn't cut away from him.

"I... You.... It was a mistake... I was afraid..." Jacen muttered, years of torment and anguish flooding back over him.

"You took my life...." She whispered back, "Are you sorry you took my life?"

Jacen felt a tear tickle down his cheek, and as he began to speak, emotion choked his throat. He stopped, inwardly fighting back the wave of emotions flooding him. He took a breath, and then tried again, "I'm... I'm sorry... You didn't deserve to die, but I was afraid I was going to die... I was afraid of losing her...."

"I didn't deserve to die, Jacen. But, you killed me. And for her?" The girl asked bitterly.

"I couldn't lose her..." Jacen moaned.

"You lost her anyway..." She said, "You lost her because of your own guilt, over me."

"I... I know... I couldn't deal with it. I didn't want to be around her. The cops... The cops blamed them, but I knew what happened. Only me. I couldn't tell her, I couldn't. She thought... she thought I was a good man..." He choked out, more tears trickling down his face. This was all coming so fast, the emotions were sweeping over him. He was running from her memory his whole life, but now he stood in front of her. He wasn't prepared for this.

"All I wanted was a quiet life. That's what I was working for, and I was so close to it...." Jacen said, dropping back down to his knees. Shame weighed on his shoulders like a mountain, "My wife thought I was a good man, she thought I was a hero. I risked my life to protect others, but that was my job and that's how I saw it. She still looked at me like I was a hero when I came home, and she loved me. She loved me more than any woman has in my life, and all I wanted was a life with her. I wanted to stop risking my life, and I wanted to spend the rest with her... When those two came into the bank that day, they threatened that dream... I was scared of losing everything I wanted, everything I needed in my life... I should have saved you. I know, I should have stopped it from happening. But, it was either you or me that was walking out that door..."

"Are you happy with that decision?" She asked, still standing above him.

He shook his head, "No.... I lost everything, even myself.... I wish I had died that day..."

Jacen wept, tears leaking from his eyes and pouring from the guilt that had weaved itself into his very being. Years of suffering and fear led him to keep his secrets in the dark, but the guilt that came from that day and the lying that followed, that guilt began to eat his soul. His wife divorced him and left him, hating him in the final days of their marriage. He tortured himself, trying to drown himself in a glass. He wound up halfway around the world in Australia, running from his own past...

He looked up, about to say something. She was gone. He jumped up to his feet, wiping his eyes with his shirt to clear them. Dried blood scraped across his skin from his shirt, but even with cleared eyes, she was gone. He searched the grass in front of the fence, but he found nothing. No footprints, no flat patches of grass where a foot had been placed. He had looked down so quickly though, she couldn't have had time to disappear that quickly. He stepped close to the fence, searching out toward the jungle's edge but still nothing. Whatever or whoever that was, she was gone.

Was she real? She couldn't have been real. He had watched her die, and then saw her lifeless body in a casket at her funeral. He knew that girl was dead. Yet, somehow there she stood. It had to of been her, only that girl would of known those details. But... how did she know his wife had left him? How did she know so much about his suffering?

He didn't understand anything, but his thoughts were quickly interrupted. From behind him the unnatural sound of whispering came, and shortly after a man stepped from the jungle line on Jacen's side of the fence. From the hundred feet away, Jacen knew who it was. Christian stood there, his perfect suit and strange white tennis shoes on. Jacen walked unsteadily toward him. He wasn't sure about Christian, but he had seemed to help Jacen when he told him to run. Before Christian arrived, the smoke had repelled itself back into the jungle's foliage. When Christian had pointed Jacen in this direction, Jacen at first thought it was to hurt him with the fence. But, Christian must have known the creature couldn't cross the fence. Maybe, he was helping Jacen. He didn't know, but right now, Christian was his only guide.

The hundred yards of terrain between them passed quickly as Jacen walked up to him, cautiously eyeing him and watching the jungle's edge behind him. Jacen suddenly wondered how Christian had crossed the fence without being hurt like Jacen. Yet, nothing about this man even came across as natural.

As Jacen neared him, Christian quickly ordered him, "Come along, we must leave now."

"Why?" Jacen asked.

Without an answer, Christian turned and began walking off into the jungle. Jacen stood a moment, and then regretfully followed him. They walked in complete silence a few minutes, and then Christian stopped next to a tree. The small clearing gave Jacen enough room to stand a few feet from Christian. Still in pain and suffering, Jacen was more than happy to stop and take a break, he leaned forward and propped himself up on his knees again.

"Go," Christian said raising his hand and pointing.

"What?" Jacen asked, still sucking in deep breaths.

"You'll come back around to the fence, and there you have to cross. You cannot trigger it though. It will kill you if you do." Christian stated, looking directly at Jacen. Something about him still felt unnatural, and Jacen wondered if he should trust this man and follow where he was being led. Besides his eeriness, this time he told Jacen he could die. Each conversation seemed to be getting worse.

"Why couldn't we cross back there then?" Jacen asked.

"Your presence isn't welcome here; it's time for you to return to your camp." The older man answered matter-of-factly. Jacen assumed the smoke-snake thing apparently still wanted him dead.

Jacen thought about those words a moment, and then nodded. "Fine," He answered and started to walk away. Before passing Christian, he stopped in front of him and asked, "Why are you helping me?"

"Your destiny isn't here."

"My... destiny? You know my destiny?" Jacen asked.

"There is a purpose for you."

Three years prior to the crash...

The heat was the worst part so far. The police, or whoever was in charge at this point, had already cut the power to the building. The dim light from outside the windows was slowly fainting away with the setting sun, and Jacen's only hope was that the cool night might circulate soon. Inside this building, things were steadily warming up over the past three hours.

Jacen leaned back against the front of the wooden desk, his legs laid flat against the floor and his tied hands resting in his lap. The hard plastic ties they used to fasten their wrists together was starting rub his skin raw, irritating him just as much as the heat. Sweat dripped from his brow down his cheek, but he was too tired to wipe it. He sat there, wallowing in his sorrow and self-pity.

She moved next to him, her head lifting from his shoulder. A sudden bright moment in the past hour was flashing up when the female bank teller lifted her head. She sighed, letting the breath out of her lungs and Jacen wanted to stuff the hot breath back into her mouth. She wasn't helping him cool down, and only out of pity for her did he allow her to rest her body against him. He could feel his left arm nestled behind her arm and against her side, the sauna of heat between their skin and sweat that had gathered really starting to drive him crazy.

"I'm so tired but I can't sleep...." She whined softly.

Others around them looked at her, all of them waiting in nervous expectation of something to happen. None of them really knew what was going to happen though; the police and the crooks were at a stalemate. Even Jacen had given up hope trying to anticipate the next event.

"It's just your nerves, and all the excitement we went through. Don't worry, don't be afraid. Nothing's going to happen now..." Jacen told her, not even sure of the truthfulness to it though. Two people were already dead. The bank manager was lying outside of the vault where Jacen was told to leave him. The elderly woman that was shot when this all started had finally bled out, and now she laid on her bank with a man's coat over her. Two women sitting in front of the bank's counter were trying to comfort a third woman who had been trying to save the elderly woman. Nothing could be done though, that woman was going to die today.

"I'm scared... What's going to happen?" She asked, the bank teller looking over at Jacen. Her blonde hair was starting to frazzle around her ponytail, and her white blouse was showing signs of sweat as well. The heat wasn't just getting to Jacen at least.

"The police negotiator will be trying to make a deal with the crooks, but I'm not sure what will happen. These two... Something was different about them. They're not here for money, I don't think." Jacen said, looking over at the office that was opposite all of them but in clear view. About twenty feet away, the wooden door of the bank manager's office was closed. The large glass front of his office though displayed the female crook sitting at the desk and talking on the phone. The male crook stood at the window, rarely taking his eyes off the group. Jacen knew he was nervous that he or any of the other hostages would try something.

"What are they after?" A man asked from across the small space between the desk Jacen leaned on and the front counter of the bank where the man leaned against.

"Don't know, whatever is in that deposit box." Jacen answered.

"Probably jewelry." The middle-aged woman next to him shook her head, saying.

"Doubt it..." Jacen answered, adjusting himself and trying to distance himself from the bank teller. She adjusted with him, keeping her weight against him. Maybe she found comfort in just being close to him. Jacen didn't know, but he hated it at the moment. He cleared his throat, "If they were after jewelry, they'd open other boxes or be trying to. They're not. They're after what's in that one, specific box. Something is in there that they need, and whatever it is, it's going to cost them."

"What could be in there that's worth going through this?" The man asked across from Jacen.

"Don't know. It's not a big box, maybe the size of two shoeboxes stacked atop each other. It can't be that big, but it's definitely important." Jacen replied.

The bank teller's head snapped around to Jacen, "We can check who owns the box..."

Jacen looked over at her, "What?"

"I can login into the bank's systems with my account, and even though I can't change anything, I can see whose name is listed for the box." She said, happy that she suddenly found herself useful.

"What good would that do us?" The man asked.

"We could give it to them, they can use it to have the police contact whoever's box that is and they can figure out what to do. This'll all be over." She said.

"Yeah, and we'll be dead." Jacen muttered.

"What?"

"You give them the info; they get into the box eventually. We don't know what's in there; they may not have any desire to leave the bank with whatever is in that box. This could be a one-way trip..." Jacen said.

"No way, they just want-" She began to reply.

"No, he's right," The man said, butting in. He shook his head, "Don't give them that info. They could be terrorists for all we know."

"What kind of terrorist blows up a bank?" She asked snidely.

"Who says just the bank? There could be anything in that box. It could be a bomb big enough to blow up a city block. They're not out to kill everybody at once, they'll do it one bank at a time." The man argued back.

"Stop-" Jacen started to say.

"That's stupid!" The bank teller jumped in over him.

"You're being stupid!" The man yelled.

"Stop! You're drawing attention." Jacen practically yelled.

The sudden movement and loud noise apparently attracted the attention of the man at the window. The male crook stepped outside the office and yelled, "What's going on? Knock it off!"

"Sorry-" Jacen started to say, making up some reason for him to be happy with and walk away. The young bank teller, though, had no intention of that happening.

"Hey, I can check-"

"Shut up!" The man yelled.

"-who's safety deposit box it is. I can give you a name!" She yelled over the man.

The male crook thought a moment, then started walking over to her. He looked down at her, "How?"

"I can login to my account, cross-reference the name. You can use it to get the cops to get the key from whoever has it. You can get in the box..." She said, almost begging him to believe her.

He stopped in front of her, thinking a moment. His eyes kept locked on her face, and he finally said, "Yeah, alright. Get up." He reached down, grabbing her hands that were tied just like Jacen's and yanked her up. She popped up to her feet. He asked, "Which computer?"

"Any of them," She said, and turned around to the desk she was leaning against, "This will work."

She stepped around its side with him right behind her. In the large office window, the female crook was still on the phone but clearly interested in what was happening out here. The bank teller sat in the chair, and the man stood right next to her, the barrel of his pistol resting against her shoulder. He warned her, "Don't do anything stupid, this is your only warning."

The girl nervously went to typing, and Jacen could only hear her quick taps of each key. He had turned, watching with full attention what was happening just like every hostage in the room was. He was nervous, knowing that this was reckless. If they lost value, the crooks could start shooting again to thin their numbers to whatever they needed to get out of the bank. This girl was stupid, and eventually going to get herself killed or everybody else.

"Here it is," She said, then typed a few more things. She pointed at the screen, and the male crook looked at it. He nodded, and then motioned with his gun, "Unplug it and go sit back down."

"What?" She asked.

"You're done, go sit down."

"I helped you, let me leave." She begged.

He grabbed her tied hands and pulled her from the chair. As she tried to keep her feet beneath her, he practically dragged her back around the desk and dropped her forcefully onto the floor next to Jacen. She hit hard against the floor, and looked back at the crook. Tears trickled down her face, and she yelled, "This isn't fair! I helped you. Let me go!"

"Can't do that, kid. Shut up." The crook said and walked away.

The girl started to yell something else but Jacen grabbed her arm and drew her attention back to him. He shook his head, making it clear she needed to shut up. Jacen turned and watched the man walk away, listening very intently to the crook's next words.

"I got a name, tell them I got a name," the man said, the female crook turning and saying something back. Jacen couldn't hear it, and he barely heard the next words from the male crook, "The name is Widmore. Charles Widmore. Tell them to get the key from him within the hour or we're putting a bullet in another hostage's head." The crook pulled the office door closed behind him.

The man across from them shook his head, "Good job..."

"Leave her alone." Jacen warned him. She acted out of fear, and Jacen understood that. He'd felt it himself a few hours ago, and the result of his fear was a dead man. He empathized with her, and now felt sorry for her. At least she learned a lesson from this though. Maybe she'd keep her mouth shut and listen to the people around her next time, instead of listening to her fear.

Jacen leaned his head back against the desk, and the young bank teller with frazzled blonde hair, a white blouse damp with sweat, and now a dirty, black skirt from being thrown on the floor, leaned her head back against his shoulder. Looking over at the front of the bank building, Jacen saw the cop cars lining the road about twenty feet from the windows. The red and blue lights were flashing with a distinct rhythm against the glass windows, and faces of officers could be seen between the flashes of light.

Jacen watched the sun setting through between a few buildings, knowing the sunset was here. The orange glow of the sky filtered down against everything below it, and soon, the darkness of night would be filled with the flashing lights of the cop cars. Jacen sighed, and felt the girl's head against his shoulder. This was at least going to end soon; a man by the name of Charles Widmore would soon be getting a call that his safety deposit box was being threatened and its contents about to be opened. Either his key would be given to the crooks, or the SWAT officers outside would soon be acting. Either way, it was more than likely going to become very dangerous inside this bank.