Chapter Text
They haven’t been in the air long when the flight attendant offers him a smile and a seat change. He flirts back for the sake of better accommodations and finds himself shuffling down the aisle to the front section of the plane. He settles into the middle of an empty row and the cute brunette slips him a tiny bottle of vodka to go with his complimentary drink. Grinning, he accepts the alcohol and shoots the girl a wink before she carries on to cater to the rest of the passengers.
They’ve got hours left to go and he’s grateful for the opportunity to blur at least a few of them as he empties the little bottle into his small cup of ice and soda. But just as he’s about to down the drink in one go, he hears a familiar sound. One that has him going still.
He would know it anywhere.
Sawyer begins unbuckling his seatbelt, fingers fumbling around the clasp, and craning his neck. Turbulence tosses him back against the leather of the chair before he can stand. He clutches the armrests the second time the suddenly bumpy flight tries to throw him back down, heart pounding, desperate to know.
A glimpse of blonde hair, the melody of a laugh that has managed to entwine itself within the branches of neurons in his brain, and eyes like an ocean—he swears he sees and hears it all just seconds before the world around them is violently shaken and they begin hurdling towards what he expects to be their death.
He must pass out before they plummet to the ground, hit his head on something, because last thing he remembers… he was welcoming the chance for it all to be over. For a chance to start again.
When he comes to, it’s hot and bright and painful, but she's the first thing that crosses his mind, the first thing he looks for. The pretty blonde on the plane.
Sawyer pushes up to his knees in the sand, staggering away from the sound of screaming and the flare of growing flames. Blood is trickling warm down the side of his face and his balance is off as he gets to his feet. He's had a couple of concussions before and he's sure he's got a real mean one in the works.
Doesn't stop him from squinting against the glare of the sun, scanning the sea of unfamiliar faces. People standing stunned, others crying and shouting, some down on the ground and not moving at all. She isn't among any of them.
He curses under his breath and stumbles through the wreckage, scrounging through dead bodies and shoving past the frantic living ones, all screaming and sobbing and desperate in their own searching.
A man in a suit and tie, staring up at the still whirring remnants of the plane, catches his attention. He recognizes him. Sawyer hustles toward the other man and grabs him roughly by the shoulders, snapping him out of his dazed study of a torn wing spewing fluid.
“Hey! Hey!” The man blinks back at him, startled but aware, coming back to the present. “The lady sitting next to you, the blonde one, where is she?”
The guy shakes his head, brows furrowing and lips parting open and closed like a fish out of water.
“Where is she?!” Sawyer repeats, his voice rising to a yell that grates its way past his throat, but a girl’s blood-curdling scream has both their heads snapping in the direction of the water.
“I don’t know,” the man finally answers, breaking free of Sawyer’s grip and racing for the pregnant girl collapsing in the sand.
Sawyer growls and helplessly scans the area once more. There are bodies floating in the water, but he can’t… she isn’t—
An explosion sends him stumbling backwards, a bloom of fire from the plane’s engine eliciting a fresh flurry of chaos and an increase in panicked movements. She isn’t on the beach. Can’t be.
The plane is ripped in half—too many pieces of the machinery missing and not enough bodies around to fit the number of seats that once existed. A few bits and pieces of the plane are scattered in the direction of a tree line, arranged for him like a trail.
He pivots from the others, from people who could probably use his help, and races for the trees.
Running blindly into the unknown of the jungle, his head swivels between the sprawling greenery and the maze of trees, the branches that could catch a body through its fall from the sky, and the uneven terrain, decorated with thick vines and overgrown roots. Articles of clothing, demolished personal possessions, a couple of shoes hanging from tree branches—he bypasses them all despite his instincts to stop and scavenge. He’ll come back. He’ll get it all on the way back.
Something hard and warm and alive smacks him in the thigh as it runs past him. Sawyer startles so harshly, he careens hard into a tree.
“Son of a bitch!” he exclaims, catching himself against the slim body of a bamboo trunk.
But when he lifts his head to search for the offending object that hit him, he finds himself watching in fascination as a yellow Labrador Retriever gallops on ahead of him.
Either that’s a dog, or the concussion is worse than he thought.
If he is still right in the head, though, and just saw some well-fed lab run past him… well, that dog would have a better idea of where it's going than he does.
Sawyer breaks into a run once more, following the animal through the thick labyrinth of bamboo trees, hustling to keep the animal in his sights. Finally, it slows to a stop a few feet ahead of him, the dog turning as if to check and make sure Sawyer was still following before stepping around the body it led him to.
His heart stutters at the immediate sight of her hair, golden and spilling across the dirt, strips along her crown stained red with blood.
It was her. Is her.
Part of him had been sure it was just his mind playing evil tricks on him when he first heard her laughing on the plane, when he managed to catch sight of her profile seconds before the turbulence became uncontrollable.
Not like he wouldn’t have deserved the cruel tease. But no, he knows the sound of her voice, the shape of her frame, the distinct song of her laughter.
The last thing he felt before they dropped from the sky was jealousy of all things. Because she was laughing at something the guy in the suit and tie who went to help the pregnant girl said.
Sawyer stumbles to his knees at her side and tries to assess the damage, afraid to touch her, to hurt her.
She’s unconscious, laid out on her back with a nasty gash across her forehead. It looks like a slow drip, but the blood is leaking steady into her hair. One side of her sweater is ripped, her jeans sullied with dirt from what must have been a harsh tumble to the ground, and her hands are grazed in varying shades of red and pink, scraped and scratched up from knuckles to nails. Otherwise… she looks almost peaceful, eyes closed and lashes dark against her pale cheeks, her lips pink and parted just enough to allow the whisper of her breath to enter and escape.
Doesn’t mean she’s okay. What if something internal is wrong? What if she’s in a coma? He’s no doctor, but she’s been knocked out after falling from the damn sky—the consequences could be endless.
Sawyer reaches for the exposed line of her throat, carefully pressing his fingers to the spot where her pulse should be. He holds his breath, but the thrum of life beneath his fingertips is steady, strong.
The dog barks—he didn’t even realize it was still with them—and takes off in a new direction. Off to recover more bodies, he’s sure.
Great, a modern-day Lassie.
The noise must wake her because her brow scrunches, a heavy inhale expanding within her chest before the breath catches. She winces and blindly reaches for her side. Her palm trips down to her ribs, fingers twisting in the ragged fabric of her shirt.
“What’s wrong? Where’s it hurt?” he demands, his own hand hovering over the offended area.
Her lashes flutter as she blinks a few times, confusion unfurling across her expression as she squints up at him. Her eyes are cloudy as they find his, the fog of sleep clearing slowly, but soon enough, those blue eyes are staring up at him again, innocent and wide and wounded.
Just like the last time he saw her.
“James?”