Author's Note: Just came off a Lost Season 2 binge, and couldn't help myself - I'm not sure how long this is going to be, or where it's going (except that it is definitely not over). I'm sort of ignoring the whole captured-by-the-Others thing, sorry. Just assume that all got worked out. They've been living on the island for quite a while. Everything else is in the story.
EDIT: Also, it was pointed out to me that in this chapter I used the wrong name for Kate's stepfather. That was just me being stupid, sorry. It is now fixed.
The children were eight, six and three when the ship came to rescue them. Two boys and a girl; Jack had wanted a girl. She found it funny that had Jack wanted a girl, when she herself was still shocked that any of them existed at all. Her babies, hers. She was a mother.
They saw it first, the whole gaggle of kids, and came pelting into the camp in a tangle of limbs and shouting voices and overgrown hair. "Something out there, Mommy! Something really big, like bigger than the whole island big!" "You stupid, it's just a bird or something." "You're the stupid one, haven't you ever heard of perspective?" "What's that?" "Did you see it, it's coming closer!" "It's a ship it is, I'm going to tell Jack!" "No, I'll tell him, he's my dad!" "Well I'll tell my dad then!" "Who cares?" "I saw it first!" "No you didn't, I did!" "Liar!" "You're the liar!" "Mommy, why are they shouting? They just saw a bird."
She scooped Emma up, stepping into the center of the crowd. They quieted immediately, knowing the slate look in her eyes. "Where?" she asked. Aaron pointed, a head taller than the other kids. She followed the line of his hand and saw it, a triangle growing on the horizon. Not a sailboat, or a motor boat. Nothing that could dock here. A ship. It was far away still, but unmistakable. It was coming for them.
"Mommy, you're pinching me," Emma whispered, and Kate's head jerked towards her daughter, having forgotten, momentarily, that she existed.
A split second later, her hands relaxed. "Sorry, honey," she said, pressing an absent kiss on her forehead, her lips catching a dark curl. "I was just surprised."
Emma's arms settle around her neck. "Are they going to take us back to where you come from?" Emma asked.
This broke the cloud of silence that had fallen over the other children. They started babbling excitedly about what they would do when they got there, and what they could take with them, and would they have to go to real school when they got there? Kate blinked, trying to think above the rising tide of excited questions. Activity was increasing on the beach. Other people had seen the ship. A small crowd was gathering near the water, pointing, exclaiming.
"Hea!" Sun hurried up, reaching for her daughter. "Did you see?" Her eyes lifted to Kate, stunned and shining. Hea grabbed her arms, bouncing and speaking quickly in a tumbling mix of English and Korean.
"The kids saw it first," Kate said. She didn't recognize her own voice, it sounded so calm. She smiled and ruffled Will's hair with the arm that wasn't holding Emma. He squirmed under her touch; he was at that age. She had to fight to keep herself from grabbing a fistful of it, pulling him tight to her. A ship, a ship was coming. "How long do you think before it gets here?"
"I don't know, a few hours?" Sun guessed, placing a calming hand on her daughter's head. "We are going to light a signal fire, just to make sure they see us." She paused, really looking at Kate for the first time. A flicker of the past crossed her face, but Kate bounced Emma, and smiled, and Sun smiled back. "It's real, isn't it? You see it too?"
"It's real," Kate said.
"Mommy," Emma said again, more insistent, "are they going to take us?" Sun smiled dazedly at Kate, and Hea asked her a question and they moved off towards the growing crowd. The other kids drifted away, looking for parents, chattering excitedly.
Kate swallowed the rising bile in her throat and shook her head. "I don't know honey. We don't even know who they are." She wanted to put Emma down, and run, but a slight move in that direction tightened Emma's arms around her neck. "Will, Matt, run and get your dad, okay?" The strain was beginning to tell in her voice, a higher tone.
"But Mom—"
"It'll still be here," she said firmly. "Go." They exchanged looks, her little dark haired boys. Will rolled his eyes, and then Matt rolled his eyes because he did everything Will did, and added a sigh, to further express his sympathy with Will's position. Which made Will roll his eyes again. Kate's lips twitched. "Go!" They went, Will tall for his age, gangly, and Matt a little rounder, baby-faced still, but right on his heels.
"Mommy," Emma said firmly, putting her hands on either side of Kate's face and turning it so Kate had to look at her. So bossy, just like her father.
"Yes," Kate said, mimicking Emma's serious tone.
"Are there really princesses where you come from? Really really?"
They had a game: three truths and a lie. The grown-ups told the kids three truth things and one made up thing that existed "where they came from," and the kids guessed which one was made up. The grown-ups always won, but the kids remained skeptical about such things as Gameboys and Twinkies and governments.
"There are a few. Not in America, which is where Daddy and I are from, but in other parts of the world. Like, England. And, uh, some other places in Europe, I think. But they're not like fairy tale princesses."
"Why not?"
"Well, they usually don't have fairy godmothers… and they were real shoes."
"Mommy! Stop being silly."
"I am perfectly serious."
It was easy to be perfectly serious about princesses.
"Will we see them? Real princesses?"
"I don't know, Em. I don't know what's going to happen. It might be… it might be nothing, we could be wrong. Or it could be a trick."
"Like what the Others used to do?"
"Yes, like that. So don't get too excited about it okay?" Good advice, Kate, stick to that advice. Don't get too worked up. Don't think about it at all.
"Kate!" She spun around, as Jack emerged from the underbrush onto the beach. The boys were right behind him, panting. They threw themselves on the sand, Will and then Matt, throwing out their arms to illustrate how hard they had worked to keep up. Jack put his hand on the small of her back, and looked out, onto the water. Further down on the beach, Sayid and Jin had already started a small fire, and others were bringing wood, leaves, anything that would burn.
"They're coming," she said, following his gaze out to sea. The triangle had grown. A cruise ship? An naval something-or-other? Why now? She thought they had found the last untouched piece of the earth, but she had been too optimistic. Oh god.
"Jack," she said, panic beginning to slip into her voice. Emma felt very heavy.
"Hey, it's okay."
His voice was not soothing, even though he meant it to be. She knelt, slowly, and placed Emma on the ground. "Daddy and I need to talk for a minute. Stay on the beach with your brothers, okay? Don't go too close to the fire."
"Watch her," Jack said to Will with a nod. Will straightened up, nodding back. With her, he whined and fidgeted, but with his father he wanted to be a man, wanted to prove something. They were all Jack's kids, she thought, not for the first time, more than they were hers. She hated herself for thinking that, and kissed Emma before letting her go, and touched Matt's shoulder as she passed him.
They walked ten feet in silence before Kate's legs gave out. She sat down, on the path, and it took Jack a minute to notice. He kept walking, five, ten paces, and then missed the sound of her footsteps behind him and turned around. Her legs felt numb. She pressed her head into her hands, raking her hair back from her face. "There's still time," she said.
He crouched beside her. "Time for what, Kate?"
She lifted her head and looked at him. He had shaved a couple days ago, ridiculous since their last blades were down to slivers, and the stubble growing in burned her cheeks at night. But he liked to pretend they were all still civilized. "They won't know who we are, at first. It'll take time for them to communicate, to sort things out. Names, and then pictures to go with names—"
"And what are you planning to do with that time?" His voice was hard, the voice she hated. He was judging her, already. Years and years they had lived on this island, and worked side by side, and lived with and in each other, and one glimpse of the old world and he was judging her again. How quickly they all reverted to their true colors.
"I don't know!" she snapped. "I'm just trying to think, I'm trying to figure out—"
"How to run away?" Jack supplied. He was so goddamned cold. Was there a glimmer of panic behind the mask? Kate stared at him, his handsome, beloved face. She was doing this wrong, they always did this wrong.
"What am I supposed to be thinking about, Jack?" she asked bitterly. "How when we get home I'll go on a shopping spree and call my mother?"
"No, we should be thinking about this together—"
"That's what I was trying to do, before you started yelling at me!"
Their voices overlapped with anger and fear; and then silence. She leaned her head into her hand, her fingers on her forehead, and then pushing back, again. Her hair swung over her shoulder, as she turned to look away, at a nearby tree. She'd caught Will climbing it a few years ago, too high, and he had refused to come down. She climbed up after him, and by the time she caught up to him she wasn't mad, just amazed at how long it had been since she had climbed so high, and she had tickled him, careful not to upset their balance, and they had been laughing up there when Jack found them, and stood below terrified and angry as they climbed silently down.
"I'm sorry," he said finally. She turned her head to look at him. The mask had melted: his mouth was no longer set so hard, and his eyes were seeing her, not his fear of what she might be.
"I know."
He reached out and smoothed back a curl, touched her neck. "You okay?"
She shook her head silently. He sucked in a breath and she leaned into him, her head against his shoulder. Their hands clasped, and they sat like that a moment. Kate stared at the greenery, and felt Jack rest his lips against her head, felt him thinking. He would want to fix this, but he wouldn't know how.
"Let's go somewhere more private," he suggested, as noise from the beach increased. She nodded and he helped her up, as if she were an invalid. He kept hold of her hand as they walked, down the path for a ways and then veering off. They settled in a little clearing, Kate sitting on a rock and Jack pacing. She leaned her elbows on her knees and watched him move, stop, put his hands on his hips. She should just seduce him, strip his jeans off and straddle those hips as she had done a thousand times – not think about anything, just enjoy the moment. Jack probably wouldn't go for that.
"We could stay here," he said, even though she knew she didn't want that, wouldn't really accept it.
"With publicity – they'll still want a full accounting of everyone. Even if they let people stay, they'll want to know who."
"We could hide out until they're gone."
She gave him a look that only managed to express a fragment the stupidity of that suggestion. "With the kids? And what, we hide every time anyone else comes? And what if we're the only ones to stay, how long do you think we'd make it without going crazy and killing each other? And… and you want to go home, Jack. I know you do. After a while, you would hate me for keeping you here. And the kids too. All their friends go off to this magical place they've heard about all their lives, and they stay here on an island with no opportunity, trapped—" She broke off. That was a clear enough portrait, thanks very much.
He had stopped moving, was staring at her. "I would stay," he said.
She sighed, shook her head. "I know. That's the point. You would stay. But not because you want to be here. It's not — it's not an option, Jack."
"Then what?"
"Like I said, maybe there'll be time, before we're all known. Maybe—"
"You can slip away? Or do you see this as a family activity?"
She shook her head again, mute, frustrated. She tried to picture them, running, and saw Tom, and the shattered glass of the windshield.
As if he could read her thoughts, Jack said, "Remember what happened last time you tried to involve innocent people?"
She was on her feet before she knew it, glaring at him. "I told you that in — do not try and use that to — to win or whatever it is you're doing. I would never put the kids in danger, you know that."
He turned away, restless and angry. She wanted to punch him. She kept seeing Tom, and the blood, and the glass. "Jack."
"I know," he said, "I know, I'm sorry." He turned back, tried to put his arms around her. She shook him off, slid her hands into her back pockets. He let her.
"I could alter a passport," she said. "I know how. There are extras, floating around. I could be someone else."
"For how long? They're going to have everyone we ever knew come and greet us. What will you say to someone's mother, who's been told that her daughter's alive?"
In the past the passport would have been enough. She wouldn't have waited to meet the mother; she would have felt bad, but not bad enough to stop, or get caught.
"We could split up temporarily," she suggested. "You take the kids, and I would meet you somewhere, once things calmed down. Some other country, where they wouldn't look for us. You can practice medicine anywhere. And if we could survive here, we can survive something else, someplace new."
"How would I explain the kids?"
"Just say I died. There's enough graves, no one would question. You would get to play the emotionally scarred but stoic single father; I'm sure you'd love that."
He shot her a look, but didn't respond to the jibe, instead asking pointedly, "How would I explain to the kids?"
"How would we explain that where Mommy came from is a jail cell?" Kate snapped back.
"Actions have consequences, Kate."
She wanted to punch him again. She knew this was because he was scared, and he didn't want to lose her, and he didn't want to lose control. Still. "Don't you think I know that, Jack? I never claimed to be perfect. But you do not get to judge me, not after everything we have been through. You do not get to tell me that I should go rot in jail for the crimes of another life, while you take our children back to your perfect life, to be perfect little citizens of your perfect world!"
"I never said that! Or that I was perfect, or had a perfect life. Don't put words into my mouth."
"It's not what you say, it's what you think. I know what you think of me."
"What? That you're the person I want to spend the rest of my life with? That you're human, like everyone else?" He was staring at her as if she was crazy. She wasn't crazy.
"No, that I am flawed, and broken, and it is your job to take care of me, and to take care of them, and be the hero, and the protector, and that one day I might be too flawed, I might be too human, and you might have to let me go."
"Let you go?" Jack repeated incredulously. He gave a short, humorless laugh and shook his head. "The point is that I will not let you go." Growing serious, he stepped closer and gripped her arms; his hands were rougher than they used to be, used to chopping wood now and not just people. "You're the one that wants to run away, Kate. It's the only thing you know. Well I am going to hold onto you. I am going to hold on with both hands, no matter what you do or say."
"So you'd rather see me in jail than somewhere you're not," Kate flung back, twisting her arms out of his grip. "At least then I'm under control, right?"
"What is wrong with you?" He grabbed her again, his fingers digging in to her arms. "I don't want you to go to jail. I don't want to lock you up, Kate, I have never wanted to lock you up." She didn't want to look at him, to see his desperate eyes. He let go, suddenly, as if realizing that his actions were running counter to his words. "And in case you forgot, you wanted kids too. You chose this responsibility, this life. You don't owe me, maybe, but you owe them."
"I owe them? You think you have to guilt trip me into staying with my own children, Jack? Is that what you thought of me, all these years?"
"Not like you haven't thought about it," Jack snapped. "I know that look in your eyes Kate. The panic. Too bad we've been trapped on an island."
Oh, here they went again. "Jack, if I had wanted to leave you, I could have left you. Believe me, I could have." They'd had this fight so many times she couldn't even count. She wanted to laugh, at how ridiculous it was. They were being rescued. She was going to be carted off to prison for the rest of her life, and Jack was going to go home with her babies and resume his suburban lifestyle, and they were fighting about something that had never happened.
"Right. Of course. How stupid of me not to notice your unwavering commitment. I'll make a note to myself next time – oh wait, Sawyer has the only paper on the island. Think he'll make a note for me?"
"This is not about Sawyer! This is about you, not trusting me. Never trusting me. I have given you no reason to doubt me—"
"Except murdering someone."
If she had known, all those years ago, that someday she would love a man, and he would be able to throw those words at her, would she have killed Wayne? Yes. No. It didn't matter; she would never have been on this island, if not for Wayne. No Jack. No Will, or Matt, or Emma. She would probably be serving hash browns in a diner somewhere, just like her mother. Or maybe she'd be dead.
It still hurt.
"Get away from me," she said, spat it across the clearing at him, and turned to walk away. Can't escape the past. Can't change. Let's not ever grow up, Peter, let's stay in Neverland forever.
She walked into the wall of green, and he did not follow her.