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Jack’s been driving for about an hour when the last two days finally catch up with him.
Two days since Henry broke the news that not only was Nathan Stark alive, and apparently happy and healthy, but that Henry knew where he was and had known for five years.
Apparently a stable wormhole existed. Jack couldn’t even begin to put wormhole and stable in the same sentence.
Allison has been out of Jack’s life for almost three years now. Henry had to have known how Jack felt about Nathan’s “death”, and he couldn’t have spilled the beans?
“For the greater good” had never felt so hollow.
So Jack had to see for himself, so armed with an address, a set of co-ordinates really, not only is Nathan alive, but he’s even in Oregon, Jack climbed into his car, purchased for when he needed something other than the Sheriff’s jeep, and headed off.
So. Nathan’s alive. Beyond that Jack doesn’t want to think. Because it’s only now he realises what this means to him. What he cannot let mean to him until he knows. Those last few seconds, the terrified green eyes staring into his, the brave scientist throwing his life away when it should have been Jack, he needs answers.
Ever since Jack landed in Oregon things have seemed a bit weird. So the fact that the entrance to this place is apparently under a bridge barely seems any different to any of the other weird things that have happened to him over the last fifteen years or so.
He finds the building, which seems to be in the middle of nowhere. Bizarrely there are two parking spaces outside. One’s occupied by an elderly, but tidy station wagon, and the other’s empty.
Jack can’t imagine Nathan driving a station wagon. For a moment, when it looks as though Jack’s driven all this way for nothing, a wave of nausea hits him so hard he gasps for breath. He closes his eyes, and struggles for control.
He leans forward a little, resting his forehead on the steering wheel, just trying to orient himself to begin the long journey back. Or perhaps he’ll knock the door and find out. It’s then he hears it, the crunch of tires.
A battered black jeep pulls into the parking space, and Jack feels a second wave of disappointment hit, because surely this vehicle is even less likely than the station wagon.It’s beat up and dirty, it has a roof rack with something large and covered lashed to the roof, and what looks like fishing rods, and it can’t be Nathan’s. He sees the driver exit, he’s tall, dark and handsome, casually dressed in board shorts, and a grey shirt, he’s not Jack’s quarry, but perhaps he knows something, and Jack’s opened the door and he’s half out of the driver’s seat when it happens.
The passenger rounds the back of the vehicle, and Jack’s heart stops in his chest. He’s frozen to the spot.
It’s Nathan.
His scientist is different. Nathan’s deeply suntanned. He’s wearing board shorts in a loud and neon print, and a hooded jacket zipped barely halfway. His ridiculously hot body looks even better in this get up than Jack’s memory can recall of Nathan in his expensive suits. The curly hair is wild; riotous, messy, sun-and-salt bleached curls fall almost to Nathan’s shoulders, utterly untamed. He looks good. So good.
Jack chokes, and Nathan turns, sharply, becoming aware of Jack’s presence.
For seconds, maybe minutes they stare at each other, the only movement Nathan’s trembling hand reaching up to remove his sunglasses.
In those green eyes, round from shock, Jack reads everything that he’s half imagined, half remembered from the day of Nathan’s death. It’s not his imagination. He takes as hesitant step forward, but Nathan’s ahead of him there.
The muscular arms close around his body, he’s hauled flat against a firm chest, moulded to the strong form as Nathan virtually folds around him. The scientist is shaking a little with the intensity of emotion, and Jack can’t fault him for that even if he still lacks the unvarnished truth, it’s too good to hold him, breathe him in, so that’s what Jack does. Explanations can wait.