Sacrifices

Sarah Southworth boarded the plane with all the others, feeling as if she was being herded like cattle. Coffee, tea, or moo? She would have smiled at her own little joke, but she was too tired. She managed to cram her carryon in a nearby overhead bin, grabbed a pillow, sat down, buckled up, and promptly fell asleep. The last thing she wanted to do was carry on some inane conversation with a total stranger and the flight from Sydney to Los Angeles was a long one. She needed to use that time to pay back a long overdue sleep loan; she felt as if she hadn’t slept in days.

It had been, in fact, almost three days since she had slept and she looked like it. Her normally pressed designer clothes had been replaced with cargo pants and a t-shirt, her hair was in a careless ponytail, and to be honest, she didn’t really care at the moment how she looked. When she got the call that HE was in trouble, she boarded a plane for Sydney immediately. It took hours of phone calls and countless forms and endless red tape, but she managed to keep him out of jail and keep him from knowing her involvement in the process. The last thing she needed was for HIM to know that she had saved his skin. All the money in the world wouldn’t save her from his wrath if he found out what she had done. That was why as soon as the last form was signed she sped to the airport and got on the first standby flight out of there that she could get, Oceanic 815.

***

The air was acrid, smoky, hot, salty. There was the whine of an engine, the shriek of ripping metal, the screams of fear, pain, despair. It was sensory overload which is perhaps why Sarah never noticed the pain in her arm or the large gash in it.

What the hell had happened? One minute she was sound asleep and the next, well, the next she was here – wherever here was. She tried to push herself into a sitting position and pain shot through her. “Okay,” she thought “let’s try that again.”

Finally managing to sit upright, she realized that part of her plane was on the beach and that there were relatively few people up and moving. Those that were moving were doing so amidst a chaotic background. From her position she could see everything clearly. One man seemed to be taking charge, taking care of the injured. Many were yelling for loved ones, searching. There were bodies everywhere. She had no idea how many survived, and based on the wreckage, it was a miracle anyone survived at all.

A young man approached Sarah, asking if she needed help. She looked at her arm and then looked at him, saying nothing and fighting the urge to laugh absurdly. Help? Who around here didn’t need help? He mumbled something about getting a doctor and walked away.

When the doc finally got around to Sarah, she was starting to feel woozy. She didn’t know if it was from the pain in her arm, the heat, the shock of the situation, or all three. Hell, it could have been because there was a gorgeous doc working on her.

“I’m going to have to stitch that up; it’s pretty bad. It’s going to hurt, but I can’t let it stay like that.” He turned to the older guy that was with him (Sarah got a glimpse of piercing blue eyes) and asked for his help. That was the last thing she remembered as she blacked out from the pain.

***

Sarah awoke with a disoriented feeling. The man who had helped the doc was sitting next to her. He smiled and said, “Welcome back.”

Back? Back from where? Oh, right. The crash. Her arm. She noticed it was now very crudely bandaged. The man was offering her water which she sipped slowly. “How long was I out?”

“Not long, considering. Is there anything else you need?”

Sarah grinned despite the pain, “A rescue? And your name so I can thank you for staying with me.”

“John Locke.”

“Sarah Southworth. And now that we have been introduced, thank you.” At least she wasn’t alone, she thought. John said he needed to check on the other survivors but promised he would be back to check on her again. She was glad. For some reason when he was around she felt a little bit safer.

***

Night descended too quickly. No rescue was on the horizon, everything was disorganized… it seemed as though the turmoil would never end. John had indeed come back to check on her, moving her to a sheltered spot closer to one of the fires and providing her with a blanket scavenged from the wreckage. She hadn’t let anyone take care of her for a long time, and even though she knew he was doing the same for countless others, it still felt nice.

Sarah was just drifting off to sleep when she heard the sounds. They were eerie, loud, mechanical… yet familiar. Something was in the jungle. Something big. Something menacing. Everyone could feel its presence and sense its danger. Sarah suddenly understood the term “paralyzed with fear.” No matter how badly she wanted to move, to run, she couldn’t budge from her spot. She couldn’t even move her eyes from the shaking tree tops.

Finally, she tore her eyes away and looked for a familiar face among the survivors, hoping to catch a glimpse of John. He was there, at the front of the crowd, close to the jungle’s edge. He was in a discussion with the doctor and several others who had taken charge that day. Their eyes met for a moment and she hoped he could tell that she needed a few reassurances, albeit empty ones. He started to head her way, and she began to relax a bit. He stopped along the way to talk to several other survivors.

That was when she saw HIM. Of all the planes to be on, and of all the people to come out unscathed, of course it had to be HIM. Surely her eyes were playing tricks on her, but the way her luck had been running, she knew that he was there. She stood up and walked away from everyone, everything. He would be far from thrilled to see her and would question her as to why she was there. He was smart; it wouldn’t take him long to figure out that she had been “meddling in his business” as he called it. Then the shit would really hit the fan. The crash, her arm, not being rescued, whatever that thing was out there, none of that was a frightening as facing HIM.

Sarah soon found herself sitting alone on the edge of the trees, watching the surf in the moonlight. The situation was so ludicrous that she didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. That was the moment that John Locke startled her out of her reverie and asked, “You okay?”

That was all it took for her to make up her mind to cry. John sat beside her and let her cry, close enough for her to lean on him when she needed to, but no so close as to be intimidating. She needed to lean on him. She needed to feel, for a moment, that everything was going to be okay. She needed to feel the warmth of another human being.

He carefully wrapped his arms around her and held her until she was asleep.

***

Sarah was right. On their fourth day on the island the shit hit the fan. She knew she couldn’t avoid HIM forever. They were, after all, on an island. It wasn’t like she had too many places to go to stay out of his sight. She didn’t know if it would be worse to face him in front of a crowd or alone, and as luck (bad luck?) would have it, fate made the decision for her.

She had been looking for fruit when he saw her. It took him less time to get to her than she had imagined. She dropped the mangos in a pile at her feet and simply said, “Sawyer.”

His anger was evident; she knew by his lack of yelling that he was struggling to keep himself in check. “What the hell are you doing here?” His scowl said more than his words, showed his fury at her supposed betrayal from what seemed like a lifetime ago. She backed into a tree, wishing now that someone else had been around. “No way you just happened to be on the same plane, Sunshine. Life ain’t that coincidental. Now tell me, how were you screwing me over this time?”

She wondered if she should tell him the truth and just get it over with. It wasn’t like he was going to believe her anyway. He was standing so close that she could feel his breath hot on her face. He continued to interrogate her, demanding to know why she had been in Sydney, why she was on his plane. He grabbed her injured arm and she cried out in pain, begging him to stop and just listen.

It seemed that from out of nowhere John appeared. Eyes that had once seemed kind now looked ominous. “Let her go, Sawyer.” The chill in his voice was daunting.

“Well, well, well. The mighty hunter’s here to save the day.” Sawyer turned back to Sarah and whispered, “It’s a big island, Sunshine, but it ain’t that big. We’ll finish this later.” She didn’t watch him leave; she kept her eyes focused on John as he walked toward her.

“Want to tell me what that was all about?” She had grown fond of John over the past four days and now she was going to have to explain to him how she knew Sawyer, why he was so furious with her. She simply shook her head. It was more than she could deal with in one day; she didn’t want him to hate her the way Sawyer did. He wiped away her tears and replied, “When you get ready to tell me, I’ll listen.”

Her whispered, “Thank you” was cut short as his lips brushed hers. At first the kiss was hesitant, as if he was unsure as to how she’d respond. Soon it deepened with both passion and tenderness, demanding and yet gentle. Sarah had been kissed plenty of times before but this was different; it was … indescribable. That made it all the more surprising when he abruptly pulled away and told her he would walk her safely back to camp, saying nothing to her along the way.

That night Sarah’s sleep was fitful at best. If she wasn’t dreaming about Sawyer’s wrath, she was dreaming of John’s kisses. Neither let her get much sleep.