Chapter 33: The Last Ship

When Hurley, Jack and the rest return to the beach camp, they're greeted by more than the smell of roasting meat. The whole Island itself seems to have poured forth its bounty in welcome. Sirrah and Chen have found honey in a colony of ground-nesting bees, and are busy stirring it into coconut cream, crushed pineapple, and nuts.

"Ambrosia," Rose calls it, from behind her secretive smile. She was the one who told Sirrah where to look for the bees.

Danielle and Juliet have each shot a boar, and the split rib cages and long strips of sirloin crackle over the fire.

The feast goes on deep into the night, and Hurley and Claire crawl into their tent long before it ends. As Hurley wraps her in his arms, she whispers for the third or fourth time how glad she is that he is safe, and relieved that the Others don't have helicopters. Then she reaches down to unstring his shorts, and soon the waves outside the tent roll in time to the ones inside, until he finally surfs into sleep on the thought that this well may be their last night in this bed.

The crisis arrives the next morning. Penny and Frank pass the sat-phone back and forth between them as Jack paces about, and Hurley's gut clenches with anxiety. Jack refuses to leave without Locke and Boone.

"They've made their choice, Doc," Sawyer says while Juliet nods, her face immobile as wax. Hurley knows the panic beneath Juliet's expressionless mask.

Pain stretches Jack's face as he struggles to explain himself. "This wasn't part of their choice. They didn't know this would happen." He pauses before the others, mostly hostile or indifferent. "Look, I know that some of you had your differences, especially with Locke—"

"Locke was the one who split," Sawyer reminds everyone. "Boone trotted right behind him like a puppy dog."

Shannon scoffs, "That's right, Jack. What do you want to do? Trek two days cross-Island just to knock on the Temple door so Boone can tell us all to go to hell?"

Penny steps forward. "As I've explained, the Searcher's captain tells me that we need to be underway for Suva in ten hours, twelve at most." When Jack gives her a blank stare, she adds, "I didn't schedule this tropical storm, Dr. Shephard. If we leave by late afternoon, we can avoid it."

Sawyer's voice rises, and if he were a hound dog, so would his back hairs. "Doc, you ain't being reasonable."

"You bloody well aren't, brother," Desmond says. "You'd best listen to this woman. Look what happened to me when I didn't."

Stubborn, Jack refuses to give in. "Then we wait until the storm blows over."

"What, and risk stranding everyone here?" Naomi pipes up. "Ms. Widmore, this isn't what I signed up for."

"Me either," Kate says. All at once, it seems as if she and Jack are the only ones in the conversation, the only two on the beach. "I won't stay here another hour longer than I have to, whether you do or not, Jack."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Jack protests. "Kate, if it were you, I'd go back for you. We don't leave anyone behind. We don't—"

Rose's voice cuts through the confusion like a foghorn. "Yes, Jack, sometimes we do."

"Rose, I don't think—"

Hurley can't keep silent any longer. "She's right, Jack. You got to listen to her." He freezes under the piercing gaze of all those eyes, then forces himself to go on. Sure, he swore to Rose that he wouldn't tell, but this is bigger than some promise. At his side, Claire gives his hand a little squeeze of encouragement.

Rose beckons to Bernard to join them over by the signal fire. "It's okay, Hurley." To Jack and Kate she says, "Locke and Boone are where they need to be."

"Rose, I understand you want to get rescued, as we all do—" A chuckle from out of sight makes Jack pause. "About Locke and Boone, you can't know that."

Instead of answering, Rose turns to the signal fire and raises her hands. A slow electric charge moves up Hurley's back, to his neck, and every hair stands on end. Just as it did during Grandpa Tito's funeral, when lighting burst out of a clear blue sky and lit up the priest like a light bulb.

The signal fire leaps into a great column of light twenty feet high, and everyone retreats from flashes of heat. Hurley pushes Claire and the baby behind him, as Jack does the same for Kate.

The little wood that remained falls at once to ash, but the steady yellow flame still mounts skyward. Rose folds her arms as it burns without fuel. "I wasn't planning on making this announcement till you all had left. But you forced my hand, Jack." She sounds mildly amused.

"Sweet baby Moses in a wicker basket," Sawyer says. "Don't you get it, Doc? She's like Jacob."

"I don't understand," says Kate.

Rose smiles. "Sure you do, honey." To Jack she says, "If Locke and Boone want to leave, they can catch a later ride." A cloak of sternness covers her, and for the first time a little fear runs through Hurley, along with the fading electric sense. No one has ever had cause to fear Rose, yet every word which falls from her lips bears the weight of judgment. "No one stays on this Island who doesn't want to be here."

She waits for the challenge that never comes.

Penny's BBC-announcer voice breaks the silence. "I'll call Captain Barnes and tell him to launch the Zodiac. We'll be able to take up to eight at a time." She scrutinizes the crowd, calculating and not liking the answer. "With all of you, just in the nick of time, I'd say." She fixes on Claire. "Women and children first."

Claire grips Hurley's hand again, hard. "I'm not leaving unless we go together."

"No suitcases, either," Naomi says. "Just whatever you can carry on your back. We'll need every inch of space."

No one moves, though, even though the decision has already been made. Out of respect for Jack, they wait.

When he nods, both Penny and Naomi sigh in visible relief. A third of the group scatters, but most of them say put.

Penny is clearly fighting irritation. "Was I unclear? We do not want to get caught out on the ocean in rafts when that storm hits. We shall be cutting it close enough as it is."

Kathy steps forward, Shana at her side, followed by Kenneth and Brian. Surprisingly, Leslie Arzt joins them, and behind him even more people. Sirrah and Chen. Scott. Steve. Rousseau's not there at all, as she, Alex, and Carl were gone before sunrise. Hurley already knows about Sun and Jin, who have made themselves scarce as well.

Kathy clears her throat before speaking. "Rose and some of us have been talking for some time about this moment."

Claire pokes Hurley and whispers, "Seems like we weren't the only ones in on the secret."

A small dread stirs inside Hurley, and blossoms. What do they know that he doesn't? Rose was sick, but she's not sick on this Island. Who knows what else had been wrong with those crowded behind Kathy?

He himself had been sick, too. Sick enough to live in the hospital for months. Not with something like cancer, either, that when you told people about it, their faces warmed up and they told you how sorry they were. That's how it went with his Grandma Titi, anyway. With him, it was something you had to keep to yourself, because people would look at you not with sympathy but fear.

He tries to catch Claire's eye, drowning in sudden confusion.

She's more interested in the drama surrounding them, especially when Frank speaks up. "You got to be kidding me. We came all this way to find you people, and you don't want to be rescued? What are you, nuts?"

"I guess so," Faith says, one hand over her curved stomach and the other around Craig's waist. "Because we're staying."

Around Hurley the sunny bright air shimmers with the aura which precedes panic. He whispers to Claire, "I got to talk to you. Right now."

She doesn't argue. As Penny starts to protest, Claire waves towards Ana Lucia and Cindy, busy rooting through their camp site while Libby talks with the children. "Take them first," Claire says, as Penny falls silent. "Might as well throw in Michael and Walt. That would be a good first run."

Michael hears his name and approaches. While he and Penny talk about bringing Vincent along, Claire steers Hurley away.

Hurley follows Claire to the grove of ironwood trees at the forest's edge where forever ago she had stroked his palm with her finger, telling his fortune and shocking him with the prediction of a long life.

Now that he has her alone, fear strangles him. His tongue feels two sizes to big for his mouth, just as it had on the first day he met her.

Across the camp site, Penny must have said yes to Vincent, because Walt and the dog both bound around, overjoyed.

At least things are working out for someone.

She squats on a fallen log and pops the baby onto the breast. "What's wrong, Hurley?"

A scant three months ago he couldn't have told her; couldn't have said anything even to Jack. He was so glad he finally did tell Claire, even though he hates bringing it up. "I dunno if I can leave. Because I might go crazy, wind up in the hospital again."

"So what if you do?"

He stands astonished, mouth open. "I can't saddle you with that. You'd be living with a mental patient, you and the baby." And any other babies they might have started, too.

The last thing in the world he expects is for her to laugh. It's not a cruel one, not even unkind. She follows it with, "Oh, you silly," and the weight starts to lift. He sits close to her, never wanting to take his eyes off her sweet face, her eyes blue and open as the sky.

"Hurley, I've never been to a wedding in my life, but I've seen movies, read stories. What's the promise, 'in sickness and in health?' What if I got sick? What would you do?"

The horror which seizes him chases away all fear of winding up back in Santa Rosa. He's seen her in pain, seen a child emerge from her body. But Claire in the hospital, maybe even dying, him losing her...

Never. "I'd never leave you. I'd do anything. Everything."

Claire takes his hand. "There's your answer. It's mine, too." She turns his hand over, exposing his palm. "This is your heart line. I have one as long and deep as yours. You think they match because of coincidence?"

"No." Having seen what he has on this Island, he believes it. He rubs his palm against hers, and the warmth runs from hand to heart like current along a wire.

She lays the sweet weight of her head on his shoulder, her words clear. "Whatever happens, we won't go through it alone."

He pulls her to his breast, tears leaking from his eyes. The baby's used to being hugged between them, and he doesn't even complain anymore.

Neither Hurley nor Claire feel the need to say good-bye to those getting into the Zodiac raft. They'll meet again on the Searcher soon enough.

The Zodiac pilot speaks only Portuguese, but he beams at the children and ruffles Vincent behind the ears. Eyes still wet, Hurley joins everyone else as the raft putts away with its first precious cargo: Ana and Libby; Cindy with Emma and Zack; Michael, Walt and the surprisingly calm Vincent.

The clear sky over the beach fills with the thump-whirr of the helicopter, as Frank and Seth, Desmond and Penny take the air route back to the Searcher.

Hurley never thought he'd be sad to say good-bye to Leslie. "How come, dude? I mean, you were always going on about getting back."

"I'm no Darwin, but there are insect species here that no one's ever seen. Arthropods, too."

"Arthro-what?"

"Pill bugs," Claire says while Leslie grins. "Roly-polys."

It sounds gross to Hurley, but if it makes Leslie happy to spend the rest of his life digging up creepy-crawlies, more power to him.

Sun gives Hurley a long, lingering hug, while Jin shakes Claire's hand, then his. Bernard kisses the top of Aaron's head before giving Hurley a sideways hug of his own.

Rose gathers Aaron into her arms and rocks him a little. "Going to miss you, baby. You got a daddy here who's going to take good care of you."

A new worry pops into Hurley's mind. "Rose, what are we gonna... tell people? You know, where we been and stuff."

"Why, honey, you're going to tell everybody the truth."

"The truth? I mean, what parts? Including the crazy ones? How is that gonna work?"

"You tell everyone what happened. You were in a crash. Most of the people didn't make it. When you got rescued, some of them wanted to stay behind. No, you can't help them find the place you crashed, because you don't know where it was."

Hurley tries to wrap his mind around this. "But what about Penny's boat? Doesn't it have like what planes do, you know, black boxes? And what if they try to rescue the people left behind anyway?"

Rose laughs. "You just let me worry about that, Hurley. Kiss your momma for me, and maybe I'll get to meet her someday."

Before Hurley can ask how that's going to happen, the Zodiac is back and ready for another load.

"Do you mind if we wait?" Claire says. "I'm not... ready."

Already those who remain have resumed the old routine of gathering wood, cutting vegetables, hanging up their nets to dry in preparation for another day. It hits Claire with a shock that she won't be here to join in. Under the Zodiac pilot's watchful eye, Charlie and Naomi climb on board, as do Sawyer and Juliet, followed by Shannon and Sayid.

It takes awhile, but eventually she and Hurley come to their farewells' end. Inside the tent, she stuffs as many diapers as possible into her back-pack and struggles with the zipper.

Packing done, she turns to Hurley and opens her arms, wanting comfort. He rocks her in his massive embrace as she rests on his soft breast. He caresses her hair, her shoulders, and roves down to the small of her back, where he works life into her the way a sculptor shapes clay.

Her life in Sydney seems like a dream, or a story she would tell to someone else. A cautionary tale, full of warnings like "Listen to your mother," and "The sweeter he talks, the less weight he carries," and "You find out who your true friends are when you fall pregnant and you didn't want to."

Like everyone else, she died on the day of the crash: not in the flesh, because never has she felt more alive, more stroked into life than she does now. The old Claire Littleton might as well have crumpled under the plane's broken wing, because that girl crying in the wreckage feels like another person from another life.

The two of them fall quiet, still entwined in each others' arms. There's no clock to lash them on save for the pounding of waves, and the baby's babble as he chews his toes.

She only untangles herself when Kate says from outside, "Claire? Guys? The raft's back. Last call."

"Hang on, Kate." She looks up to Hurley, taking in his sweet face, those warm brown eyes whose tender gaze matches that which blossoms inside her. "You ready? Because if you're not—"

He bends over and touches his forehead to hers. "It'll be awesome."

She breathes him in, all of him, so generous in body and heart. "I can't wait."

No one has warned Claire that a Zodiac raft lifts halfway out of the water, or how fast it travels once it gets up to speed. With one arm she grips Aaron so hard that he squeaks, and with the other clings to Hurley. After a few moments she leans into the motion, letting the wind and spray play over her, adjusting her own movements to the rhythm of the boat.

She turns to Kate, snug under Jack's encircling arm. "So, what's the first thing you two are going to do when we get back?" It's a game the survivors have played many a time, with lightweight answers like eat a double cheeseburger, or jump in the sauna, or catch up on the latest episodes of House, MD.

Instead, Jack and Kate fall serious as judges in a courtroom drama, and Jack answers for her. "Find the best team of criminal attorneys in Los Angeles."

Kate nods, and it strikes Claire that this is the first time she's ever seen Kate afraid. Aaron's snug in his sling, so Claire loosens her grip and takes both Jack and Kate by the hand. "It's going to be all right. I know it."

Jack leans over to Kate, brushing her hair with his lips as he says to her, low and intimate, "Whatever it takes, we're going to do it."

The Zodiac turns a little. Behind Kate and Jack, the Island swings into view, and Claire notices that the Island doesn't shrink as they travel away from it, but instead seems to sink beneath the sea. She keeps watching until the last jagged green mountain-top vanishes beneath the wide blue line of the horizon.

"Claire, look," Hurley says, tugging on her arm.

The Searcher looms in front of them, a massive silver boat at least forty meters long. As the Zodiac pilot cuts the engine, the raft drifts into her wake. Shannon, Sayid, and a host of others who've boarded before them all stand along the rail, waving.

"O arnês!" the pilot calls up to the crewmen above. "O arnês!"

From the deck of the Searcher, someone lowers a kind of chair with a strap. The Zodiac pilot grins to Claire and points to it. "Para você. Para você e o bebê."

"Go on, Claire," Hurley says. "That way you don't have to climb the rope ladder with Aaron."

The Zodiac pilot straps her and the baby in. As she is lifted high above the raft, up along the gleaming side of the ship, Hurley's eyes never leave her.

Sayid and Desmond pull her over the rail and onto the Searcher's deck, where Shannon and Kate draw her into their arms. Vincent strains against his leash with wild barks as Hurley struggles up over the rail, red-faced and determined.

Jack arrives on board last of all. It's so like him, Claire thinks. Her brother won't set foot on deck until everyone else is safe and secure.

It suddenly becomes very real. They're going home.

(continued)

(A/N: We're close to the end, constant readers. Next time: an epilogue, telling how and where everyone winds up.)