Disclaimer: We are on chapter five, folks, and if you haven't realized that I don't own Lost by now, something's up. (I DON'T OWN LOST!)
Reviews! Gee-hee-hee, I love you all! Thank you so much for continuing to review me, it makes the groveling seem oh-so-worth it! (Also, Bette's name is pronounced like the word 'bet'. You know, like Bette Midler? It's okay that you didn't know!)
A/N: Chapter five of "The Pilgrimage" has finally been completed, and no one is happier about this than me! I'm so sorry it's literally like taken forever, but I've been busy for real. But I've finally finished, and I'm extremely happy with the end result! I hate to toot my own horn, but I think this is my favorite chapter so far. I mean, things are starting to happen now! It's getting a little intense. So, I'll shut up now and allow you to read the newest installment of "The Pilgrimage"! Enjoy!
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In a bolt of burning hot confusion, Jack awoke from his not so fitful slumber feeling more suspicious than he'd ever been in his life. It was like some freakish sixth sense- the way his spine pricked every time he breathed, the way his heart was pounding in his chest as if something was terribly wrong...it almost made no sense. But then again, things of that nature rarely did.
And at this moment, Jack felt very, very odd. Like he was being watched.
Glancing over at Locke and Claire to make sure they were still asleep, he started to inch out of his sleeping back, trying his very hardest to make no sound at all, closing his eyes in tension every time he made the faintest of sounds. Strangely enough, he found himself transfixed on Locke's face...it looked so childlike. Not stern, not abrasive...just childlike. His red mouth was open slightly, his cheek smashed against the hard jungle floor. Even a silent little river of spittle came flowing slowly out of his open mouth, gathering on the wet leaves. Jack laughed to himself. How cute.
If they ask me where I'm going, I'll tell them I'm taking a piss, he thought anxiously, still somehow befuddled on why exactly he felt the need to leave their camp (even if nature was calling, he would normally be too scared). He knew in his heart of hearts that leaving their camp wasn't too smart; in fact it was pretty damn stupid, but that pricking in his spine- his insane heart beat- could not be normal. Jack didn't know if he would yet call it paranormal, but normal was so far out of the question.
With the lightest footfalls he could muster, he walked slowly over towards the black line in the sky the remains of the cave left in the just-beginning-to-rise sun. It brought back memories-primarily ones featuring Charlie Pace himself. And all of a sudden, he found himself startled to realize that he actually missed the man. Strange, he thought bemusedly. Come to think of it, he hadn't really thought of Charlie once during this journey. And he was supposed to be saving him. How very strange indeed.
What was even stranger was the faint, barely audible noise of someone muttering.
"Who's there?" His nasally, trembling voice penetrated the thick morning air and made shivers run up his spine like little white spiders of fear.
"I'mma get 'em, Boss..." A weak, breathy voice called out shakily into the middle of the darkness.
"Oh, God," Jack whispered faintly under his breath, mostly to himself. He was shooting his head in all directions, finally having reached the level that was rated one step above frightened: Piss-yourself-afraid. "Who's there?"
"I swear to you, I swear..."
With numb hands he reached for his gun, and then realized with a painstaking amount of frustration that he hadn't even brought it with him. Damn! He could envision it now, lying soundlessly in his sleeping bag, with the safety on, of course, in case he caught the trigger in his sleep. How terrible would that be, shooting yourself during your sleep? But now he stood scared beyond his wits at these insane mutterings, with no gun to at least make him feel a little bit better. Like a fool he approached the voice, trying so very hard not to shriek like a little girl.
"Yer' gonna be sooo proud of me..."
Now Jack threw both of his hands into the thick night air, trying to grab a hold of something...a stick, a log...anything, to protect himself from this insane stranger, lurking about.
"Things are gonna be so much better..."
"Show yourself!"
"I SWEAR TO YOU!"
A shot went off in the dead silence of the jungle- a shot who's destination was unknown by both the shooter and the intended prey...that is until one of the two felt a terrible, swelling sensation in their thigh area that hurt terribly, terribly much.
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The sound of a gunshot exploding into the early morning darkness awoke Claire with such a start that for the second time in her life she sincerely thought that her heart was going to fail. They scared the wits out of her, guns. Half of that horrible fear stemmed from the fact that her parents had both been what the public deemed 'damn dirty hippies' (they preferred the term 'nature-loving pacifist'; Grandpa Bill had deemed them both pussies) who heavily, heavily shunned the idea of guns and their multiple uses. The other half of this fear stemmed from the current situation, which, at the moment, seemed like nothing other than sheer chaos. With this crazy pilgrimage they were on (as well as the crazy dreams she had been having), she half-guessed that it was indeed her that got shot before she was awake enough to realize that she was just fine...asleep in her little blue sleeping bag from the hatch.
Soon after Claire cleared all of that up, the next thought that came crashing into her mind like a tidal wave was: Where the hell is Jack?
This question was answered quicker than she expected when she heard that strong yet wavering voice that could only belong to a man such as Jack, calling out maybe a couple hundred of feet into the depths of the jungle. He was calling for Locke, and the ferocity of sheer terror that escaped his lips chilled her to the bone.
"LOCKE! HELP!"
Claire couldn't distinctively remember when exactly she had become so assertive- so forward. She liked to think it was motherhood (by the way, I wonder how Aaron's doing this morning, she thought) that pulled her from her calm and timid ways. But, deep down, she knew the answer like she knew the back of a car seat, which in high school, she knew very well. It was this new thing she had to learn- this new thing called survival. And it was this new thing that made her jump from her sleeping bag like a bolt of lightning, gun tight and pulsing in her hand, to wake up Locke, or, if it had to go that far, go help Jack herself.
It didn't have to go that far, fortunately. All it took was a swift, solid kick to wake Locke up, and God knows the moment that man's eyes open, he is awake and as alert as a bloody deer.
"Claire? W-What's wro-"
"Jack's gone!" As she spoke, she found herself growing more impatient, and more ready to dash into the jungle herself and take matters into her own able hands. "He called out for you...I heard a gun."
Locke had no verbal response; rather, he threw his sleeping bag to the ground like some fierce animal and was standing next to Claire with his gun cocked in less than a second. As if he had prepared his whole life for a situation like this.
They looked at each other, and something locked in their eyes. It was a mixture of bravery, courage, and determination, all of which were new to Claire. She nodded at the bald man and ran into the jungle, silver pistol swinging in hand.
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It had been somewhere around three hours since Zeke stumbled upon Charlie and Bette in the jungle, sitting across from each other next to the lake like two lovesick teenagers, ready to delve into each other's pants. Good thing I put a right stop to that, he thought good-humoredly, looking at both of their faces across the scorching orange fire, the light on their cheeks dancing uncertainly.
The plan was going wonderfully, and Zeke couldn't have been any happier. Freddy, of course, was a little late getting back, but he didn't think much of it. Probably found himself terribly interested in a squirrel or something and lost track of time. It wouldn't be very surprising if he did, the silly boy.
"Now Charlie, before I take you back to camp, we need to reach some sort of...understanding."
Trying to keep a straight face in front of the boy was awfully hard, Zeke was starting to discover. Mostly because he looked like death warmed over. But that was part of the plan. He had to remember that. He had to.
"And before that can happen, you're gonna have to tell me why you're doing this. Why do you want to cause so much pain?"
Because it has to be caused. Because I need you right now for the sake of this island. "You know I don't want to cause any pain now, Charlie-"
"You don't think stealing away a mother's child will cause pain? You think it's okay?" The young man's face twisted in both pain and anger as he shot his hand over his wound. The wound that would kill him in another day or so, Zeke noted with dismal calmness.
"I think it's necessary, Charlie, for reasons of my own."
"Well, until you feel like sharing those reasons you can stay in the middle of the jungle and twiddle your bloody thumbs because I am never going to help you."
A numb bolt of nervous tension shot Zeke with such force that he found himself nauseous, but he hid this with a sharp little smirk that Charlie, across the fire, found both hateful and terrifying. "I expected that much, of course. I knew you were a faithful kind of guy, Charlie. Even faithful to the ones that hurt you."
"Sod off," Charlie muttered, turning his head towards the jungle, eyes straining to see anything that could take him out of this situation. He tried to focus on the traces of the newly rising sun; specs of gold barely able to be seen in a sea of black. As he did this he thought he heard the sound of something exploding, resonating faintly across the depths of the jungle.
"Here's the deal. You're going to have to choose, Charlie, and I know you're going to make the right decision." As Zeke said this, he smiled a sickly smile as he saw Charlie's head turning towards him again, eyes wide in both attention and disbelief. "Either you take us to your camp and tell us exactly where the baby sleeps, or we go to camp ourselves, kill the mother, and make everybody think it was you." The young man's eyes were two spheres of fire, glowing in the orange light. "And they'll believe that pretty easy, won't they?"
Charlie stumbled with his words. "W-Why do I have to show you where Aaron is? If you say you'll go and kill Claire-" He paused and closed his eyes. "...And if you do, why can't you just get Aaron by yourself? It doesn't make sense!"
Zeke folded his arms across his burly chest. "Oh, yes it does. We don't want to disturb your camp, Charlie. We don't want to have to storm in there like big brutes and steal Baby Aaron. Hell, we don't even want to kill your little girlfriend. Why? Because they think they're safe from us, and the longer we have them thinking that, the better off we are. Remember, Charlie? Half of the people from that plane think that they're rid of us...that we'll leave them alone. What they don't realize is that we keep this island running. See, if you go into camp tomorrow night and bring us the child, no harm done. You'll have to live with us from then on, of course, but that's better compared to the other option." He was lying through his teeth, and Zeke knew it. Charlie would be dead soon after he fetched Aaron for them. But, he had to leave out that part of the deal.
"But if you don't cooperate, Charlie, things will be much, much worse before the end of things. Like I said, we'll have to kill Claire and then kill you. Make it look like a murder-suicide. And we'll get Aaron in the end anyway. So there's your two options. We get Aaron and no one is hurt, or we get Aaron and Claire dies. You have to choose one, Charlie. Which will it be?"
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Running through the jungle with Locke had seemed so dream-like and distant to Claire; like an out-of-body experience. She could feel herself moving, quickly at that, and she could hear her and Locke's strained breathing as they dashed among the crackling leaves. She could even feel the small, dainty little gun, held firmly in her sweaty palms. But the beat of her heart seemed miles away...and time seemed to just keep going and going, like some eternal nightmare.
What she saw next was so startling that she considered the possibility that she indeed was dreaming, and that she would wake up at camp feeling foolish, or even wake up in her bed at Australia, belly still pregnant with Aaron. Before she ever knew of this cursed island or Charlie Pace. But when she actually saw what she had stumbled upon; actually looked at it closely, she realized that something like this was too real to ever be fake.
Claire saw Jack first, standing and looking quite intact but very distraught, and a tall-looking blonde man dressed in rags, bleeding profusely from his thigh with a gun in his hands. With disbelief she looked at Jack, then Locke, and then finally back to the mystery man sprawled on the ground. She could feel her fumbling lips trying to formulate a question. "What happened?"
Jack looked at her calmly with his sky-blue eyes. "Claire, Locke...this is Freddy. It appears as though he's shot himself." At this he placed his hands on his hips and chuckled. "He didn't have the safety on."
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Charlie's heart was racing with such astounding speed as he gazed upon that wicked face across the fire, bathed in a crackling orange glow. Numbly, he could feel Bette's hand rubbing his back, trying to comfort him. What she didn't know was that this could never have any comfort- that the decision he was being forced to make would determine whether or not the two people he loved more than life would either live or die. His fate...well...that had already been forgotten by him. Instead his mind was full of restless images of the first time he saw Aaron, his face screwed up in childish tears; when Claire had kissed him on the cheek, a kiss that seemed so innocent, yet it had felt more intimate than any sex he had ever had with any woman in his life. He saw the dream, of Claire bathed in the silver moon-glow with a knife through her chest...a knife that he held in his hands.
It was with this image buzzing around in his head that he made his decision, perhaps the last he would ever make. And dear God, may it be a good one.
"I've decided."
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Next time: What has Charlie decided to do? What will the three castaways do with Freddy? And what is the deal with Bette (I promised to tell you this last time, but I never got to it)! Find out in the next installment of "The Pilgrimage"!
A/N: I told you it was action-packed! Wow, that took forever to write, but now that I read it, it doesn't seem like that much. Oh well! I'm still happy with it, and hopefully you are, too, faithful reviewer! You know the best way to relay whatever feelings you hold for this newest chapter? REVIEWS! (YAY!)
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