10.

Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay – Spousal Duty – Bargaining – Awkward Phone Call - Meanwhile

South Beach Harbor, San Francisco

Richard Alpert waited on the dock, hands tucked away in the pockets of a pair of black pants. His dark blue jacket flapped lightly in the seaborn wind, and he squinted at the name of the boat – Our Mutual Friend - with a bland calm that belied gnawing worry. He didn't have to wait long with his thoughts. The door to belowdecks popped open with a quick snap, and a familiar face marked with both curiosity and mild suspicion rose into view.

"What're you doing here, brother?" Desmond Hume finished emerging onto the deck of his ship, once-shaggy hair trimmed back into neat shortness, a touch of grey emerging along the hairline. He crossed his arms across himself, gaze flicking up the dock for any other visitors. "Thought we were done with all of you. Thought I heard you were done with all of..." He shrugged. "All of that."

Richard forced an easy smile. "Hello, Desmond. I am, I think. Though at the risk of worrying you or convincing you I'm lying, I'm actually here to talk to your wife. Is she here?"

It was Desmond's turn to squint, looking Richard over without a response. One came from the still-open door to below instead. "Des?"

"It's all right, Penny. I'll be back down in a moment." He didn't take his eyes off Richard. "I don't think she needs to tal-" He cut himself off at the sound behind him and turned his head to see.

"What's wrong with your voice?" Penelope came up the stairs behind her husband. "What's... oh."

"I'll handle it, Penny. Can you stay with Charlie?" Penelope didn't move, instead looking at Desmond with a thoughtful expression.

Richard tried to crane his head to look Penny in the eyes. "Mrs. Hume, I'd really like to talk to you."

"I don't think it's a good idea, brother. I think it'd be best if you just go. Penny?" Desmond uncrossed his arms to reach a pleading hand towards his wife, who had taken another step forward. Her face had steeled itself into another expression, one of cautious curiosity. "Penny."

"I'm a big girl, Des. I can take care of this myself." She tossed him a quick smile. "He's playing with his trucks in there. I think he'd like it if you went down there with him. You know what all the little different ones are, I don't."

"Pen."

Instead of responding to her name, she gave him a quick peck on the cheek and another smile. Defeated, he retreated belowdecks, but not without shooting Richard a warning glance. The door shut behind him as Penelope turned back to Richard. "Well, here I am. What did you want?"

Richard paused a moment to lick his lips and glance down at his feet, arranging his thoughts carefully. "I wanted to talk to you about the people that approached you to buy out your shares in Widmore."

"I see." Now she crossed her arms across her body. "Why?"

"I've ah... I've been approached and told some things are going on there. Things that affect people we still know, people we might still worry about. I've been approached, too, though not for a sale. Eloise was. Eloise Hawk-"

She cut him off with a lopsided smile. "I know who she is. My father kept me shielded from a great deal about his life, but I know she was part of it. I saw the paperwork, I know she was granted shares in the corporation." She tilted her head. "They bought her out. That's quite some consolidation going on there."

"The man that arranged those buyouts is dead. Did you know that?"

"No." Her eyebrows pinched together, thinking. "But he was from Hanso, I know that much."

"My visitors were from Paik." He watched as she shook her head. "I know, that makes no sense. But it's what I was told."

"By whom?" She searched his face when he didn't reply. "I see." She looked away, across the blue water, eyes lidding against the sun. "So there you are, I was approached by Hanso brokers. Is that all?"

"I wanted to talk about some more details you may know. Maybe you know more about your father's company that could me understand what's going on here."

"Maybe I do, at that." Penelope bit her lip, brushed a strand of hair away from her face. "This is for you, then. You're not representing them." She jutted a chin at the ocean.

Richard shook his head.

"I may be able to do something. But first, I want something from you."

"I'm out, Mrs. Hume. I represent no companies, I have no contact with the island. There's not much I can give up."

"I find that hard to believe." She raised a hand to cut off his protest. "That you have no contact whatsoever. That man won't leave a possible informant alone."

He dropped his eyes and nodded. "I have an emergency line. A phone number. I can get word to them."

"I want that phone number. He owes me an answer to a question. Now, it's not fair that I'm holding you to someone else's due, but let me worry about that. Give me the number, and a number where I can contact you. When I'm done with my part, I'll consider whether to help you. And when I do, I'll either call you. Or I won't. If I don't, that's your answer for help." Another flick at unruly hair. "It's the only bargain I have in this situation, and I'll use it. I'm sure you'll forgive me for being tired of being the one under risk." She watched his face for a response.

Richard opened his mouth, closed it again, then nodded. "All right. I'll wait for your call." He pulled out a pale brown card and scribbled the numbers on it, handing it over with a nonchalance he didn't feel. He finished the act with a half-bow and turned to go, letting her watch his back as he departed.

The situation, like many things over the last decade, had left his control and moved forward of its own volition. This time, it didn't leave him queasy. Instead, there was a lingering sense of amusement and respect. She'd hate for it to be said, but I think she did learn a few useful things from her father. Bargaining is not a trivial skill.

. . .

Penelope waited until late at night, the card Alpert had given her tucked carefully under a book. She laid still until Charlie called out in a nightmare, and then after tending him, left her husband curled around the sleeping boy to comfort him the rest of the night. She waited even a little longer, sure that Desmond's breathing came soft and heavy, lost in deep rest. Then she slipped out from the cabin that she shared, took the little card and her cellphone, and slipped up to the deck of her home.

With hesitation, she plugged in the first set of numbers and let it softly ring for a long time. She held her breath, waiting, as the click came as someone picked up on the other end.

"Mittelos, Office 108. How may I direct your call?"

Her breath came with a shared measure of startlement and relief. It wasn't him. Not yet. "I would like to speak to Mr. Linus."

The voice on the other end took a long pause. "Mr. Linus is seldom in the office, ma'am. May I take a message?"

"No." She inhaled. "Please have him call me back directly. This is Penelope Hume and it is quite important."

Another long pause. "Very well, Mrs. Hume. It may take a little while. Mr. Linus travels frequently. Please give me a number to contact you."

She did, then hung up and leaned back to look up at stars hanging bright in a midnight sky. The phone hung loosely in her hand, and she nearly dropped it when it vibrated her back out of her thoughts less than ten minutes later. She pressed accept, put it to her ear, and held her breath.

"Mrs. Hume?" The voice was careful, not so much a monotone as kept to a bland and nonthreatening standard. Penelope sat there, frozen by the reality of it. "Mrs. Hume? I apologize if the connection is poor. I might try again."

"No. I'm here."

"I am to understand that this call is important. Who gave you this number?"

"Richard did." She looked down at the smooth, waxed floor of the deck. "It's very important."

There was silence from the other end of the phone. Penelope could picture him, sitting very still and waiting for her to get on with it. The image she kept wore the same clothes as that day. She didn't know him in any other fashion. She found the image unnerving, wondering how close he kept a gun. Was he at a desk? Did it sit next to him, in a drawer?

The image continued into a quick flash of memory, and she blurted it out. "You came to hurt me."

It was his turn to let the phone line sit in an unbearable span of empty air. Finally - "Yes."

"You were there, you had the gun, and my son came out from the cabin and the rest happened. My Des in the hospital, you got away."

"Yes. Like that."

She gritted her teeth, replayed the memory. His face. The dip of the gun. Was that real? "My son came up and you saw him. Desmond charged you into the water. What happened in between?"

Another pause. "Excuse me?"

Was the memory real? She closed her eyes. "You hated my father. Your quarrel wasn't with me."

"My daughter died. I thought it fair at the time."

"And my son would have had no mother."

"But he does."

She opened her eyes. In the tone, somewhere in the crackle of static, in a crack she thought she might yet still have imagined, she had her answer. "You changed your mind. I saw the gun dip, just before he hit you. I did, didn't I?"

There was no response. She heard one anyway. "I accept your note."

"Mrs. Hume?"

"I forgive you." She hung up on him and rested the phone against her forehead, feeling both lighter and somehow heavier than she thought possible.

. . .

Across the sea, Benjamin Linus sat at a slim wooden desk in the study of his new island home, an expression of pure shock on his face. The phone rested, forgotten, in his hand. The bleating of it fell on empty ears as he stared out a window and into a dawning morning.

. . .

London, England

William Flood, the fledgling CEO of the European bioscence branch of Paik, paced within the confines of his office. He shook his head at regular intervals, nearly losing the earbud style of phone he had clamped to the side of his head. "No, sir. I don't know. I told you all that we found; some random movement out of their office in Portland. Seasonal hiring. Nothing that tossed up a red flag. No- no, I've got people watching as closely as legally poss-"

He grimaced. "Sir, I don't think this is a good time to consider the illegal options. Not yet." Because for one damned thing, if our guys get caught doing that shit, it's my ass out on the wind.

If Bill Flood were slightly more moral or even focused on his own life, he might have contrasted his concerns about illegal observation and wiretapping with his history of murder, but at that particular moment, the thought never crossed his mind.

"Yes, I'm still going through the files. Half of it's still under recovery; everything we took from Hicks is nearly useless. I've got a one inch stack of paper about a two year study of polar bear shit. That's the sort of thing I'm dealing with. Yes, I'm having people in our office do the work with me. I can't very well do all of it. I realize it's top security. Sir. Sir." He continued to pace, his stride taking him next to a pile of sagging cardboard boxes that smelled faintly of smoke and burnt rubber and metal. Stamped on one of them was the logo of the Lighthouse Dharma station. "Yes, it remains my top priority. You know, when I'm not trying to convince people I'm qualified to run a bioscience facility!" He snapped the last, then paled at his own insolence. He remained quiet for a long while.

"No, I don't need to join you in Korea. I'm fine. I can handle this. Yes, sir. I know sir, I'm very sorry." Another set of paces, then a pause at some implied threat. "I'm up to the job, sir. I'll find you what you wanted to know. Meanwhile, can I advise working on some loose ends?"

The response brought him a smile. Here was something he knew how to handle. "Don't worry about a thing, sir. It'll take a little while, but we'll get the cleanup underway."