In Shallow Seas We Sail

Author's Note: Okay, it's still Friday for me, so you get this update earlier than expected. It might also mean that you'll get another update this weekend. Maybeeee.

The winner of the one-shot is Jaclyn Parker!!! Congrats! I'll probably do another one of those later.

Enjoy,
Sara

*

I don't want to wait for this
A ruined list, the longing kiss
Cutthroat Collapse

[8]

"What does it mean?"

He sure as hell didn't know what it meant, but then again, he wasn't the one who wrote it. His grip tightened on the paper. He could hear the paper crunch. "You wrote it," he said.

"Easy, Sawyer," Jack said, laying a hand on his arm, "She doesn't know what she wrote. She doesn't know what she said." He pulled the paper from Sawyer's hand and traced his finger down it. "I think maybe it's – "

"What's going on?" Cassidy said from the front hallway. She'd finally put Clementine to bed and was dressed in her pajamas.

"Nothing," Jack said, cramming the paper into his pocket.

"Your girlfriend ever come back?" Cassidy asked, addressing the question to Sawyer. Before he could respond, however, she caught sight of Kate's bloody nose. "What happened? Somebody punch you?"

Kate managed a tight laugh. "No, no. Just…I get bloody noses sometime. Jack was, he was trying to tell me how to stop them."

Cassidy looked closely at the group; all three were kneeled in the floor. It was obvious that she wasn't buying it. "Listen, I know you think I'm easy to con," she said to Sawyer, "but I'm not. I figured you out then, didn't it? I might not be so good at it by myself, but I know when something fishy is going on." She paused. Jack stood and offered his hand to Kate. Sawyer stood as well. After giving them a good stare-down, Cassidy continued, "And I know that something fishy is going on. Right now."

"Cassidy, I – " Kate began.

"You all are in my house. And face it, none of you are too damn intimidating now that Blondie took off, so I think it's time to tell me what's going on. What's really going on?"

Sawyer listened closely to Cassidy's words and remembered how not too long before, he knew it would come to this. Cassidy was crazy, but not stupid. He caught Jack's eye and nodded quickly. Jack led Kate to the couch and had her sit down. He sat beside her and motioned for Cassidy to take a seat in the armchair.

Sawyer perched on the couch arm. He was still antsy; that little rat bastard had Juliet, and he didn't have time to sit down for a pow-wow with his ex about time travel. Regardless, he accepted that he could do nothing until the figured out what Kate's note meant. He could do nothing…because he didn't know how to get back to the island. He didn't know how to save her.

"Listen, Cassidy," Jack began.

Cassidy cut him off. "No, let him tell me," she jerked her head toward Sawyer.

Jack only nodded and kept quiet, allowing Sawyer to do the talking.

Sawyer told everything as best he could and as quickly as he could. The longer this conversation took, the longer he would be in the dark on how to help Juliet. He tried to remain calm, to convince Cassidy of all this. He wondered why she wanted him to tell her, especially since she likely believed, with good reason, that he was the biggest con-man of the group. He tried to explain Kate's condition, and he even told her what they believed happened to Juliet.

When he finished, Cassidy regarded them with suspicious, narrowed eyes. "You confirm this?" She glanced between Kate and Jack.

Kate nodded, and Jack answered the affirmative.

"So you crashed on an island. You two escaped," she said, looking pointedly to Jack and Kate, then to Sawyer," and you didn't. You lived with Barbie for three years, then you all came back, set off a bomb, and erased the past three years and some odd months, and then your plane didn't crash." All three nodded. Sawyer sighed impatiently. "You thought Goldilocks was dead, but she wasn't, but she set off said bomb, and now the island wants you back, so it's torturing Kate and giving you all flashbacks, and someone – Ben, right? – kidnapped your girlfriend, and now you have to go save her."

"Essentially, yes," Jack said.

"But the island wants all of you, not just her?"

"We assume," Jack answered.

"You ever think they just took her so you'd go back?" Cassidy asked.

Jack looked at Kate, Kate looked at Sawyer, and Sawyer stared at Cassidy. "That's exactly why they took her," Sawyer said softly.

"What?" Kate asked.

"Her name wasn't on the list," Sawyer explained.

Jack pulled the paper out of his pocket and smoothed it on his leg. Sure enough, Juliet's name was not present.

"They know how to get us to go back," Jack said.

"How?" Kate asked. Because of her flashbacks, she was out of the loop.

"By taking away what we love," he replied. He looked at Sawyer. "You have to go back for Juliet, I have to go back for…" He trailed off, looking at Kate, who was still trying to piece together what was transpiring. He probably thought it better not to tell her that she'd prophesized her own death. "They knew we wouldn't go back otherwise."

After a moment, Cassidy let out a slow breath and then began to laugh. "Oh, you should see your faces," she said.

Sawyer looked up, alarmed.

"You don't think for a minute that I believe any of that, do you?"

"Well," Jack said, "You have three people telling you the same story."

Cassidy's smile faltered, but she shook her head. "Things like this," she said, "they don't actually happen."

"We thought the same thing," Kate said, looking Cassidy straight in the face. "I wouldn't lie to you, Cass. I – even when I came back, I came to visit you. Sawyer told me, told me to check on Clementine, and I did. We were friends, even then."

Cassidy glanced down at her hands. "Kate –"

"Cassidy, we aren't asking anything from you. We're asking for nothing more than for you to believe us. We're not conning you because we're not gaining anything from this," Kate pressed.

Cassidy nodded, still laughing in short breaths. "I don't think I believe you, but for your sake, I'll pretend like I do."

Sawyer stood. "Okay, hate to break up this heart to heart, but now that we've all had our times to explain the unexplainable, we have to figure out what we're going to do next."

Jack looked back down at the paper. "I think the answer lies here."

"What do you mean?" Kate asked shakily.

"The names on this list…me, you, Sawyer, Hurley, Sun, Jin, Sayid, and Locke…we're the ones that have to go back."

"But how?" Sawyer asked.

Jack tapped the last name on the paper, which Kate had circled. "She wasn't on the island, not that I know…she's the one that will help us."

*

Hurley felt lost and completely alone. This time, he didn't even have Charlie to comfort him…probably because this time, Charlie wasn't dead.

All day long, he drew pictures of palm trees. Despite all the other things on the island, this was the one thing he'd latched onto. Not polar bears, or hippie vans, or the trusty Dharma symbol, just palm trees.

"How are you feeling today, Hugo?" the nurse asked, smiling down at him and his colored pencils. He felt like a child.

"Fine," he answered.

"That's a very nice tree," she said.

"Thanks." He didn't speak much. What could he say? He supposed he could tell them about the island. He was already in the Looney Bin, why not tell them? But then again, he knew there was always somewhere worse.

He had slipped easily back into his old life, one that was startlingly devoid of the bad luck he'd suffered before the flight. He figured he deserved some good luck, after all he'd suffered on the island.

However, the cycle was endless. One night in his dreams, the man came to him, dressed all in white, and all around him, there were palm trees. "You know you have to come back, Hugo," the man had said.

Against his better judgment, he found himself nodding, and it was true: he knew he had to go back. "I don't want to go back," his voice said, surprisingly not adding dude, it didn't seem to fit this man.

"But you have to."

"What if I don't?"

It seemed the man had taken this as a dare, and he intended to show Hurley exactly what would happen. Visions, flashbacks…those damn palm trees. And finally, nose bleeds.

At night, Hurley would beg the man to come back. He'd do anything now. Even go back to the island.

The nurse wandered away, moving on to assess the art of the next person. Strangely, though, he still felt a presence near him. He glanced over his shoulder; one of the male nurses approached him. "Hugo, do you feel up to a visitor?"

Jack. Finally. Hurley had called him, told him everything, told him he didn't know what was going on. But Jack hadn't come.

After everything Hurley had been through, when he followed the nurse up the hallway and into the meeting room, he wasn't surprised to see the person who was seated there.

*

Juliet woke, eyes gritty with the remaining tears she'd shed in her sleep. Ben was still seated across from her, and when she opened her eyes, he smiled. She pulled at her arm, only to find that she was cuffed to the seat. "Necessary?" she questioned coldly.

"Instructed," Ben replied and unlocked the cuffs.

Juliet didn't ask from whom he'd received his instructions. She knew Ben, and she knew it would do no good to ask. He led her to the sub hatch and threw open the door. He stepped aside and gestured for her to ascend the ladder first. Always the gentleman.

Although she expected the bright sunshine she'd experienced when she first arrived, she was met with only darkness. She climbed out of the sub and waited for Ben. After a few seconds, Ben's face appeared. His eyes locked with hers. "I'm glad you came, Juliet. You don't know how much you've helped us." With that, he walked past her and beckoned her to follow. She gazed around the place for a while before finally catching up to Ben. To her, this felt all too familiar. The cycle would never end.