Cubic Zirconia - Lost - Ana Lucia/Michael
Title: Cubic Zirconia
Pairing: Ana Lucia/Michael
Word Count: 2000
Rating: PG-13
A/N: Written with writing_rainbow's 'Treasure' prompt and lostfichallenge's 'Unfinished business'.
Summary: She's trying not to watch him.
She's trying not to watch him - she's trying real fucking hard.
Her legs are aching. Her whole body is. She's overheated, sweat on her forehead, and she wants to stop just like the others. When they whine at her she wants to give in, nod, and say that they can take ten minutes in the shade to catch their breath. Every muscle in her yearns to do so and she feels so out of breath. Would five minutes really kill them?
But then she thinks of the kids and she thinks of Cindy and she thinks of Goodwin, and she remembers why they can't stop. 'cause, yeah. Those five minutes could kill them - or worse, much worse.
She wipes the back of her hand against her forehead and keeps trudging onwards: her gaze is shifting towards Michael again, checking in on him, up on him. Something like that. She should be watching the guy with the bullet wound, or the Korean. Michael's pretty much harmless, too stressed out about his son to be a threat. Maybe that's why she's watching him. Maybe that's why he's dangerous. Push a parent too far and you never know what they'll do. Ana Lucia still remembers what it felt like to pull the trigger. Thinking of the kid she'd lost, she knows she'd do it again, again, again, if she had the chance.
Michael is staring ahead like a bloodhound: at least he's stopped yelling now. If Ana had heard him shouting for his boy one more time she'd have had to take extra measures to stop him. The sound of his voice, raw and desperate… She couldn't have listened to that for another second, not without breaking down herself.
"You okay, Mike?" she whispers - and she only glances once over her shoulder, tells herself she's just asking in order to make sure he isn't about to collapse like the Southerner. It's not like she cares. Not like she trusts him.
"Michael," he corrects. He's out of breath and his voice is ragged. "I want to stop. We need to stop."
And he's talking too loud and she should tell him to shut up or keep his voice down. Not that it matters. Trekking through the jungle, even as quietly as they can, they're probably making enough noise to be heard clearly from a distance. If the Others were after them, really after them, they'd have no trouble hunting them down and picking them off - but she doesn't want to think about that. It's easier to tell herself that there are things she can do, precautions they can take: staying quiet and keeping moving are placebos for the mind.
"We will," she says. "Soon." Her version of 'soon' isn't quite the same as everybody else's: his annoyed grunt tells her that. She wonders if he'll stand up to her if she doesn't let them rest, their hero, their diamond in the rough; she wonders if her people would back behind him if he did, if Libby and Eko and Bernard would take his side.
They probably would, she realises as they trudge onwards. I've never been a 'people person'.
*
She tells herself that she's not watching him after the funeral - that she's not watching anyone.
Watching them means she cares; watching them would mean that she actually gave a damn what they thought about her. Watching them… That'd mean she'd have to see the hatred in their eyes, the blame. She killed one of them. Shannon, that's her name. She killed Shannon. Never met the girl, but she didn't have to. The broken look in Sayid's eyes had told her everything she'd needed to know: Shannon had been worth ten of her.
She's not watching him, but she sees Michael trudging up the beach towards her. His eyes still have that vacant, haunted look that she remembers from looking in the mirror at her own face after she'd woken up in hospital. It always seems like a lifetime ago, but seeing that raw pain on Michael's face brings those memories crawling back.
Michael doesn't say hello - doesn't say much of anything - but he sits down beside her. Once he's sitting there it's harder to ignore him. It's hard to pretend that she doesn't notice him by her side, real and there and non-threatening. His arms move around his legs as if hugging him and she spares a glance, just a glance, to the side so that she can take him in.
He's not looking at her, staring at his knees and the holes in his trousers instead, so she allows the glance to expand just a little. She doesn't know what she's looking for, but his profile doesn't give it to her. He's blank. She needs more than that.
"Nobody blames you, you know," he says - she knew he was going to say that. She'd been waiting for it. It's what comes next that's a surprise. "And I think that's kind of the problem."
"What?"
"Shannon died." He shakes his head, and she sees his jaw clench. "She died, Ana, and my boy's missing and nobody's angry. No one's blaming anyone, no one's out for revenge. They're scared, but they're not…"
"They're not gonna do anything about it," Ana finishes for them. She remembers building the pit for Nathan herself. She remembers killing Goodwin. She remembers catching Jin. She's a doer. She's scared and she's angry and she's empty - but she's not willing to stay that way.
"Yeah," Michael confirms. "I want my son back."
She nods, but she doesn't know what he wants from her, doesn't know why he's come to her to say all this. There's nothing she can do. Nothing she can even fucking suggest - she doesn't know where the Others are or how to find them. Not even Eko could do that. Those people are goddamn ghosts.
So she smiles, though it's more like a grimace. She nudges her arm against his and watches his lips straighten to one thin line. "We'll get him back, Michael," she promises, "and I mean that."
From the way he looks at her - really looks at her, with his eyes so dark they're almost black right now - it's like he actually believes those hollow words.
*
After that it gets busy, it get weird - there's Jack and there's the Others and watching Michael isn't an option she has to worry about anyway.
Yet he's there, always there, always irritating her with his presence or lack thereof. Sawyer goes back to harassing a receptive Kate; Jin goes back to his wife; and Michael keeps on obsessing about his son, keeps on pushing for them to mount a rescue mission. That's a sure-fire way to get them all killed, but Ana doesn't know how to say that. Not to him.
It's when she catches a rare glimpse of him on the beach - looking tired and stressed out, but strong and determined - that she sighs and knows she has to go over there. He ought to be her responsibility now as much as Libby and Bernard are. Eko… well, he's no one's responsibility but his own.
"Mike?" she says as she walks over to him. The sun's beginning to set and he pauses to look towards her. Standing by the fire, the orange light glows upon his skin.
"Michael," he corrects, as always.
"Yeah," she agrees absent-mindedly, one hand finding her way to her hip as she watches him closely. She'd thought - she'd hoped - that he might calm down, settle down, accept what had happened once they got back to the beach and his friends. Instead the look in his eyes is more desperate than ever. It's been a long time, hasn't it? He probably knows right down to the hour how long his son has been missing. "How're you doing?"
"How do you think?"
Fair enough, she supposes with a shrug. That should be her signal to back off. There's nothing she can do here. There's nothing left to salvage. "Just thought I'd check in," she says like an apology.
That hard, empty look in his eyes at least seems to soften as she says that - his eyebrows raise, just a little. Not much. His hands have found their way to hook his thumbs into his pockets and he watches her like he's no longer certain what's going on. "Well-" he stumbles. "Thanks? I'm…"
The words still won't come so she shakes her head. "Don't worry about it." The beat is awkward, uncomfortable. Her hands find her pockets and she shrugs. "Just… Come see me sometime. You're not alone in this, Mike."
This time he doesn't bother correcting her.
This time he nods, he smiles - just a little, just a twitch - and she begins to feel that maybe all hope isn't lost.
*
She should have kept a closer eye on him, should have realised he wasn't as stable as he'd been pretending. When Michael takes a gun and disappears into the jungle, Ana knows that there's only one person she can blame: herself.
She should've known. She should have been inside his head and should have been able to prevent this before it got a chance to happen. Instead the whole world's out of control and there's one of them in her hatch and there's… It's getting pretty wild here. When the sun falls and night crawls around she thinks she could really do with having Mike around: just to be there, not even to talk to. Thinking about where he might be and what might be happening to him leaves an unpleasant shiver crawling up her spine.
"You look worried," Jack tells her - and he's smiling so she smiles back because Jack's a nice guy and that's what you do with nice guys. Smile and flirt and feel tingly in the pit of your stomach, maybe even lower. If there's something wrong, something distant in her smile he doesn't notice or chooses not to.
"You're trying to form an army," she says, "and I'm guessing it's not just for kicks. Whatever you saw out there in the jungle… It scared you." His smile begins to fade like a punctured balloon. She never was any good at subtly. "And that's good. Fear's good - 'cause these people, Jack, they're not gonna stop at anything to get what they want."
Jack's smile is wiped clean by now and he refuses to look at her: Ana's okay with that. It's to be expected. Nobody likes hearing the truth, especially when 'the truth' involves dire predictions of death and kidnappings.
"They've taken Michael's kid," she says. "Now they've probably taken Mike too. So, yeah, I'm worried. I'm really fucking worried." She tells herself it's because the Others are closing in on this camp too, because it isn't the safe haven she'd hoped it would be. She doesn't think of Michael. She doesn't think of what they might've done to him. She doesn't think that they've probably shot him, that he's probably dead, that he's probably just another mark on their scoreboard.
"It's going to be okay, Ana," Jack promises, almost lost for words.
She doesn't even pretend to believe him.
*
Yet, somewhere deep down, she does believe him and it is okay and though she's scared - they're all scared - and though she's hated… They get by.
For a while.
The thoughts of the man in the hatch won't stop ticking around her mind: one of them, she thinks. One of them.
And Jack's taking care of him. Jack's looking after him, tending to him, actually protecting him. 'Henry Gale' should be taken out the back and shot like a dog. Screw getting answers out of him when it's clear he'll never talk. The memory of his hands around her neck is enough to help her make this decision. Should have been, anyway. Looking down at the gun in her hands, she doesn't know where she lost that strength.
She hears shuffling footsteps within the hatch but she doesn't bother to look up. Jack and the others are away trying to tease the guns away from Sawyer's possession - the only person in the hatch with her is Michael. She doesn't look up.
She stops watching him. She starts trusting him.
And that is her first and final mistake.
Pairing: Ana Lucia/Michael
Word Count: 2000
Rating: PG-13
A/N: Written with writing_rainbow's 'Treasure' prompt and lostfichallenge's 'Unfinished business'.
Summary: She's trying not to watch him.
She's trying not to watch him - she's trying real fucking hard.
Her legs are aching. Her whole body is. She's overheated, sweat on her forehead, and she wants to stop just like the others. When they whine at her she wants to give in, nod, and say that they can take ten minutes in the shade to catch their breath. Every muscle in her yearns to do so and she feels so out of breath. Would five minutes really kill them?
But then she thinks of the kids and she thinks of Cindy and she thinks of Goodwin, and she remembers why they can't stop. 'cause, yeah. Those five minutes could kill them - or worse, much worse.
She wipes the back of her hand against her forehead and keeps trudging onwards: her gaze is shifting towards Michael again, checking in on him, up on him. Something like that. She should be watching the guy with the bullet wound, or the Korean. Michael's pretty much harmless, too stressed out about his son to be a threat. Maybe that's why she's watching him. Maybe that's why he's dangerous. Push a parent too far and you never know what they'll do. Ana Lucia still remembers what it felt like to pull the trigger. Thinking of the kid she'd lost, she knows she'd do it again, again, again, if she had the chance.
Michael is staring ahead like a bloodhound: at least he's stopped yelling now. If Ana had heard him shouting for his boy one more time she'd have had to take extra measures to stop him. The sound of his voice, raw and desperate… She couldn't have listened to that for another second, not without breaking down herself.
"You okay, Mike?" she whispers - and she only glances once over her shoulder, tells herself she's just asking in order to make sure he isn't about to collapse like the Southerner. It's not like she cares. Not like she trusts him.
"Michael," he corrects. He's out of breath and his voice is ragged. "I want to stop. We need to stop."
And he's talking too loud and she should tell him to shut up or keep his voice down. Not that it matters. Trekking through the jungle, even as quietly as they can, they're probably making enough noise to be heard clearly from a distance. If the Others were after them, really after them, they'd have no trouble hunting them down and picking them off - but she doesn't want to think about that. It's easier to tell herself that there are things she can do, precautions they can take: staying quiet and keeping moving are placebos for the mind.
"We will," she says. "Soon." Her version of 'soon' isn't quite the same as everybody else's: his annoyed grunt tells her that. She wonders if he'll stand up to her if she doesn't let them rest, their hero, their diamond in the rough; she wonders if her people would back behind him if he did, if Libby and Eko and Bernard would take his side.
They probably would, she realises as they trudge onwards. I've never been a 'people person'.
*
She tells herself that she's not watching him after the funeral - that she's not watching anyone.
Watching them means she cares; watching them would mean that she actually gave a damn what they thought about her. Watching them… That'd mean she'd have to see the hatred in their eyes, the blame. She killed one of them. Shannon, that's her name. She killed Shannon. Never met the girl, but she didn't have to. The broken look in Sayid's eyes had told her everything she'd needed to know: Shannon had been worth ten of her.
She's not watching him, but she sees Michael trudging up the beach towards her. His eyes still have that vacant, haunted look that she remembers from looking in the mirror at her own face after she'd woken up in hospital. It always seems like a lifetime ago, but seeing that raw pain on Michael's face brings those memories crawling back.
Michael doesn't say hello - doesn't say much of anything - but he sits down beside her. Once he's sitting there it's harder to ignore him. It's hard to pretend that she doesn't notice him by her side, real and there and non-threatening. His arms move around his legs as if hugging him and she spares a glance, just a glance, to the side so that she can take him in.
He's not looking at her, staring at his knees and the holes in his trousers instead, so she allows the glance to expand just a little. She doesn't know what she's looking for, but his profile doesn't give it to her. He's blank. She needs more than that.
"Nobody blames you, you know," he says - she knew he was going to say that. She'd been waiting for it. It's what comes next that's a surprise. "And I think that's kind of the problem."
"What?"
"Shannon died." He shakes his head, and she sees his jaw clench. "She died, Ana, and my boy's missing and nobody's angry. No one's blaming anyone, no one's out for revenge. They're scared, but they're not…"
"They're not gonna do anything about it," Ana finishes for them. She remembers building the pit for Nathan herself. She remembers killing Goodwin. She remembers catching Jin. She's a doer. She's scared and she's angry and she's empty - but she's not willing to stay that way.
"Yeah," Michael confirms. "I want my son back."
She nods, but she doesn't know what he wants from her, doesn't know why he's come to her to say all this. There's nothing she can do. Nothing she can even fucking suggest - she doesn't know where the Others are or how to find them. Not even Eko could do that. Those people are goddamn ghosts.
So she smiles, though it's more like a grimace. She nudges her arm against his and watches his lips straighten to one thin line. "We'll get him back, Michael," she promises, "and I mean that."
From the way he looks at her - really looks at her, with his eyes so dark they're almost black right now - it's like he actually believes those hollow words.
*
After that it gets busy, it get weird - there's Jack and there's the Others and watching Michael isn't an option she has to worry about anyway.
Yet he's there, always there, always irritating her with his presence or lack thereof. Sawyer goes back to harassing a receptive Kate; Jin goes back to his wife; and Michael keeps on obsessing about his son, keeps on pushing for them to mount a rescue mission. That's a sure-fire way to get them all killed, but Ana doesn't know how to say that. Not to him.
It's when she catches a rare glimpse of him on the beach - looking tired and stressed out, but strong and determined - that she sighs and knows she has to go over there. He ought to be her responsibility now as much as Libby and Bernard are. Eko… well, he's no one's responsibility but his own.
"Mike?" she says as she walks over to him. The sun's beginning to set and he pauses to look towards her. Standing by the fire, the orange light glows upon his skin.
"Michael," he corrects, as always.
"Yeah," she agrees absent-mindedly, one hand finding her way to her hip as she watches him closely. She'd thought - she'd hoped - that he might calm down, settle down, accept what had happened once they got back to the beach and his friends. Instead the look in his eyes is more desperate than ever. It's been a long time, hasn't it? He probably knows right down to the hour how long his son has been missing. "How're you doing?"
"How do you think?"
Fair enough, she supposes with a shrug. That should be her signal to back off. There's nothing she can do here. There's nothing left to salvage. "Just thought I'd check in," she says like an apology.
That hard, empty look in his eyes at least seems to soften as she says that - his eyebrows raise, just a little. Not much. His hands have found their way to hook his thumbs into his pockets and he watches her like he's no longer certain what's going on. "Well-" he stumbles. "Thanks? I'm…"
The words still won't come so she shakes her head. "Don't worry about it." The beat is awkward, uncomfortable. Her hands find her pockets and she shrugs. "Just… Come see me sometime. You're not alone in this, Mike."
This time he doesn't bother correcting her.
This time he nods, he smiles - just a little, just a twitch - and she begins to feel that maybe all hope isn't lost.
*
She should have kept a closer eye on him, should have realised he wasn't as stable as he'd been pretending. When Michael takes a gun and disappears into the jungle, Ana knows that there's only one person she can blame: herself.
She should've known. She should have been inside his head and should have been able to prevent this before it got a chance to happen. Instead the whole world's out of control and there's one of them in her hatch and there's… It's getting pretty wild here. When the sun falls and night crawls around she thinks she could really do with having Mike around: just to be there, not even to talk to. Thinking about where he might be and what might be happening to him leaves an unpleasant shiver crawling up her spine.
"You look worried," Jack tells her - and he's smiling so she smiles back because Jack's a nice guy and that's what you do with nice guys. Smile and flirt and feel tingly in the pit of your stomach, maybe even lower. If there's something wrong, something distant in her smile he doesn't notice or chooses not to.
"You're trying to form an army," she says, "and I'm guessing it's not just for kicks. Whatever you saw out there in the jungle… It scared you." His smile begins to fade like a punctured balloon. She never was any good at subtly. "And that's good. Fear's good - 'cause these people, Jack, they're not gonna stop at anything to get what they want."
Jack's smile is wiped clean by now and he refuses to look at her: Ana's okay with that. It's to be expected. Nobody likes hearing the truth, especially when 'the truth' involves dire predictions of death and kidnappings.
"They've taken Michael's kid," she says. "Now they've probably taken Mike too. So, yeah, I'm worried. I'm really fucking worried." She tells herself it's because the Others are closing in on this camp too, because it isn't the safe haven she'd hoped it would be. She doesn't think of Michael. She doesn't think of what they might've done to him. She doesn't think that they've probably shot him, that he's probably dead, that he's probably just another mark on their scoreboard.
"It's going to be okay, Ana," Jack promises, almost lost for words.
She doesn't even pretend to believe him.
*
Yet, somewhere deep down, she does believe him and it is okay and though she's scared - they're all scared - and though she's hated… They get by.
For a while.
The thoughts of the man in the hatch won't stop ticking around her mind: one of them, she thinks. One of them.
And Jack's taking care of him. Jack's looking after him, tending to him, actually protecting him. 'Henry Gale' should be taken out the back and shot like a dog. Screw getting answers out of him when it's clear he'll never talk. The memory of his hands around her neck is enough to help her make this decision. Should have been, anyway. Looking down at the gun in her hands, she doesn't know where she lost that strength.
She hears shuffling footsteps within the hatch but she doesn't bother to look up. Jack and the others are away trying to tease the guns away from Sawyer's possession - the only person in the hatch with her is Michael. She doesn't look up.
She stops watching him. She starts trusting him.
And that is her first and final mistake.