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alliecat8Title: Time Out
Pairing: Jack/Sawyer, Kate, Sun
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 536
Written for![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
fanfic100's prompt #38, Touch
Spoilers: Through "...and Found", + future spec, nothing about the big spoiler
Disclaimer: Only mine in my dreams
Sawyer can feel, but he can’t see. He’s too tired to open his eyes. There’s a reddish-purple haze behind his lids, the vivid color of a fresh bruise, the color of pain. He can hear, too, but not well. Not over the heavy thud of his own straining heart.
“Come on, Sawyer, get in the game.”
It sounds like Jack’s voice, but that can’t be right. Jack is part of that other place, the place he’d dreamed of after the plane went down. He figures he must have been in a coma, maybe still is. But things are starting to come back to him.
“I know you’re in there.”
And that’s odd, too. The nurse – the scary one, the one who keeps threatening to slap him – sounds just like Kate. It irritates him, this apparent inability of his to stop thinking about dream people, people who don’t exist except in his head.
He can’t smell or taste anything, either, nothing but the putrid rot of his infection, the scent and flavor of death. But Sawyer can feel.
He can feel in layers. The first, almost all-consuming layer is the throb, the sting in his shoulder, but he can’t feel his arm at all and he wonders if he lost it in the crash. The second layer is fire, searing his skin, and he doesn’t know if it’s fever or if he’s really been burned. The next layer is the feel of hands on his body. There are the cool, soothing hands of the gentle nurse, the one who rubs the salve into his shoulder, the one who makes him want to drift and rest. There are the abrupt, demanding hands of the other nurse, the one he hates, the one who cleans his wound and his body and strips him of his pride and dignity and makes him want to survive, if only to prove to her that he can take care of himself. And there are the firm, callused hands of the doctor. Hands that peel away the bandages, that probe his most painful spots and make the agony flare to unbearable heights, then cover him in his protective layers again until the time comes for the ritual to begin anew. The doctor’s hands are competent and self-assured but sometimes, when he grips Sawyer’s good shoulder and orders him to wake up, they tremble.
He wants those hands to be Jack’s, but they aren’t. Jack doesn’t exist. Sawyer remembers the plane coming apart, remembers falling. He remembers a long, vivid dream that he thinks was brought on by fever and drugs. Now he’s in a hospital, struggling to wake up, struggling to live. He’s in a bed. There are sheets underneath him, sheets covering him, and the hateful nurse pushes him around every day when she changes them. There are needles, and he can feel the sting of an IV line in the back of his right hand, the cold flow of fluid seeping into his body. He isn’t on an island. He isn’t in the wild. The hands that are touching him aren’t Jack’s. Jack isn’t real. Sawyer knows that he won’t feel Jack’s touch again, and somehow, that’s the worst feeling of all.
End
Link to Pt. 2, "Cold"
Pairing: Jack/Sawyer, Kate, Sun
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 536
Written for
fanfic100's prompt #38, TouchSpoilers: Through "...and Found", + future spec, nothing about the big spoiler
Disclaimer: Only mine in my dreams
Sawyer can feel, but he can’t see. He’s too tired to open his eyes. There’s a reddish-purple haze behind his lids, the vivid color of a fresh bruise, the color of pain. He can hear, too, but not well. Not over the heavy thud of his own straining heart.
“Come on, Sawyer, get in the game.”
It sounds like Jack’s voice, but that can’t be right. Jack is part of that other place, the place he’d dreamed of after the plane went down. He figures he must have been in a coma, maybe still is. But things are starting to come back to him.
“I know you’re in there.”
And that’s odd, too. The nurse – the scary one, the one who keeps threatening to slap him – sounds just like Kate. It irritates him, this apparent inability of his to stop thinking about dream people, people who don’t exist except in his head.
He can’t smell or taste anything, either, nothing but the putrid rot of his infection, the scent and flavor of death. But Sawyer can feel.
He can feel in layers. The first, almost all-consuming layer is the throb, the sting in his shoulder, but he can’t feel his arm at all and he wonders if he lost it in the crash. The second layer is fire, searing his skin, and he doesn’t know if it’s fever or if he’s really been burned. The next layer is the feel of hands on his body. There are the cool, soothing hands of the gentle nurse, the one who rubs the salve into his shoulder, the one who makes him want to drift and rest. There are the abrupt, demanding hands of the other nurse, the one he hates, the one who cleans his wound and his body and strips him of his pride and dignity and makes him want to survive, if only to prove to her that he can take care of himself. And there are the firm, callused hands of the doctor. Hands that peel away the bandages, that probe his most painful spots and make the agony flare to unbearable heights, then cover him in his protective layers again until the time comes for the ritual to begin anew. The doctor’s hands are competent and self-assured but sometimes, when he grips Sawyer’s good shoulder and orders him to wake up, they tremble.
He wants those hands to be Jack’s, but they aren’t. Jack doesn’t exist. Sawyer remembers the plane coming apart, remembers falling. He remembers a long, vivid dream that he thinks was brought on by fever and drugs. Now he’s in a hospital, struggling to wake up, struggling to live. He’s in a bed. There are sheets underneath him, sheets covering him, and the hateful nurse pushes him around every day when she changes them. There are needles, and he can feel the sting of an IV line in the back of his right hand, the cold flow of fluid seeping into his body. He isn’t on an island. He isn’t in the wild. The hands that are touching him aren’t Jack’s. Jack isn’t real. Sawyer knows that he won’t feel Jack’s touch again, and somehow, that’s the worst feeling of all.
End
Link to Pt. 2, "Cold"
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no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 02:25 am (UTC)lol -- okay it is your fic I've no right to make demands.
I like this concept - the Island as a hallucination. I'm really interested in seeing Part 1. And a part 3 maybe.
Hint hint
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Date: 2005-11-01 05:15 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 02:25 am (UTC)So what happens in part 1?
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Date: 2005-11-01 05:19 pm (UTC)Thanks for following along, even though my timeline's on crack! :D
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Date: 2005-11-01 03:11 am (UTC)Dang! That was amazing- some of your best work yet!... and realistic. I really felt Sawyer's pain- both emotional and physical.
I had no idea how much I'd miss Jack (and the doctor that he is) until you took him away. :( Poor Sawyer.
I love the hallucination aspect... sad, so sad. I want them all back together in one big dysfunctional family. *sniff*
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:25 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 07:31 am (UTC)I thought eventually I'd be overdosing on these ailing!Sawyer fics? But I'm not. I'm really, really not. :D
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Date: 2005-11-01 05:29 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 05:13 pm (UTC)This was really wonderful...with that whole "It was all a dream" type twist that I adore (especially because its just heartwrenching to us as well as Sawyer). Can't wait to read more, though I love this on it's own.
Missed you! Thanks for your concern before Wilma *hugs*
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Date: 2005-11-01 05:21 pm (UTC)So glad you checked in, even if it's only for a second. *big hugs*
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Date: 2005-11-01 08:06 pm (UTC)What a unique piece...hurt delusional Sawyer...or is he really in hospital?Mystery!
*luvs*
pr.2 and no pr.1?-you're like George Lucas,lol!
no subject
Date: 2005-11-01 11:48 pm (UTC)Wanna know what's worse? I had pt. 3 all planned out, and Sawyer said no, he wasn't through being delusional yet, so now there's a NEW pt. 3 AND a pt. 4 in the works, and I STILL haven't finished pt. 1. *headdesk*
Thanks for reading and for *luving* :D
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Date: 2005-11-01 10:37 pm (UTC)Confused, wounded Sawyer is good. I don't think we can ever have enough Confused, Wounded Sawyer fics.
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Date: 2005-11-01 11:52 pm (UTC)I'm so glad you liked it. That inspires me to get back to work on pts. 1, 3, and now argh, 4! ;D Thanks for the feedback!
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Date: 2005-11-02 12:53 am (UTC)Great story. Now I really want to read Part 1.
So sad...poor Sawyer =(
I friended you...hope you need another one. I come bearing cookies! =)
no subject
Date: 2005-11-02 02:15 am (UTC)*friends back*
no subject
Date: 2005-11-02 01:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-02 02:20 am (UTC)And I STILL taunt my flist! I sat down to finish pt. 1 and what should emerge but a totally unanticipated sequel to pt. 2. And it's ALL YOUR FAULT. (You'll see.)
*hugs and glomps you*
no subject
Date: 2005-11-02 03:31 am (UTC)Saw a bumper sticker the other day: I brake for hallucinations.
He can feel in layers. This whole paragraph -- nicely done. I liked matching the descriptions with the characters we know.
Eager to read the other 3 parts!
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Date: 2005-11-02 04:46 pm (UTC)So glad you liked it. The answer will be revealed today. I hope. ;)
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Date: 2005-11-02 04:50 pm (UTC)He *is* cute when he's hurt. :) I'm so addicted to wounded!Sawyer I can't stop writing about it. I think I need an intervention.
Thanks so much for reading! :)
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Date: 2005-11-03 09:18 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-04 03:35 am (UTC)Thanks so much for reading. :D
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Date: 2005-11-03 09:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-11-04 03:39 am (UTC)I know. After I posted pt. 2 first and got the responses I did, I was kind of glad I did them out of order, because it gave a little added element of mystery. I really want to do a where-did-the-island-go fic at some point, and that was a good warm-up.
I'm glad we see eye-to-eye on the sympathy for Sawyer front. He brings out my protective instincts. Jack's too. ;D
Thanks again for reading!
no subject
Date: 2005-11-09 06:20 am (UTC)*pets poor Sawyer, moves onto next part*
no subject
Date: 2005-11-09 09:02 pm (UTC)*takes a break to dream about petting poor Sawyer*
Thanks for reading! I see a new one of your on my friends page. *off to read*