Fic: Deep Six
Title: Deep Six
Author: interpretthis
Fandom: Lost
Characters/Pairing: Ben, Juliet, Ben/Juliet implied
Genre: Angst
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Ben can’t breathe. Juliet’s smile doesn’t reach her eyes.
Notes: Spoilers for 3x06. Cross-posted to fanfiction.net,
ficinabottle,
lost_fanfic, and
henrygalelovers.
Ben woke slowly, the consciousness creeping in gradually, growing more potent by the second as panic took over. He tried to breathe, but his lungs protested violently, screaming, threatening to burst. They would settle for nothing but oxygen, it seemed. He couldn’t see a thing. It didn’t matter if he kept his eyes closed or opened them as wide as they would go, willing them to catch anything in the blackness, form a single shape out of the overwhelming nothingness of nothingness of nothingness. The darkness was suffocating. Ben’s heart thumped loudly in his chest, pulsing wildly through his veins, in his head, through his thighs. The panic intensified with every beat of his pulse. It fled from his sternum, rushing outward in ripple after ripple of pure, unadulterated fear.
It took Ben about ten seconds to realize he had accessible senses other than sight. He shot his hand out to the left and it immediately rebounded, springing back to hit his hip. He clutched it in pain. Stupid, stupid. He reached his right hand out hesitantly in the other direction. It moved but ten inches before colliding more softly with a hard, wooden surface. Ben’s heart twanged more loudly, and he reached up with both hands, hoping, doubting, hoping, doubting, doubting, doubting. Ben’s hands made contact with wood a mere dozen inches up. His eyes slipped shut, and he took a short breath, stopping when he felt he’d used too much of his precious oxygen. The corner of his right lip twisted up and he took a cynical look at his mental scoreboard: Hope 0, Doubt 1. He knew already who would win in the end.
Ben was not surprised when then hammering started. Twang after twang after twang after twang of metal on metal, sinking into wood. He didn’t fight it. He breathed more easily now, adjusting to the small space. He felt the twang of his heart slow as he calmed, fading into the more intense twang of metal on metal. Nail into coffin, nail into coffin, nail into coffin. He should have known.
And then the dark surrounding his eyelids grew brighter, his shut-eye vision suddenly a fuzzy red. His eyes inched open. Took in the bright, shiny white lights reflected on the bright, shiny white linoleum floor. The twang, twang, twanging of the nails flowed seamlessly into the beep, beep, beeping of his stat monitor. His neck ached. He wanted to turn his head, but he was stuck downward, staring at the bright, shiny white lights reflected on the bright, shiny white linoleum floor. The door opened and closed with a click. He could see shoes and the bottom of blue scrubs. A dot of blood adorned the hem of the pants. He stared, fascinated, as the scrub-wearer moved toward him, more of their red-stained uniform coming into view until there were so many bits of blood Ben didn’t know where to train his eyes.
Juliet leaned down. Looked up at Ben from below the operating table, one of her secret smiles playing around her lips. Ben hated that smile with a fervent passion. He felt the corner of his lip turn up once more into a pleased smirk that didn't reach his eyes. Juliet smiled, close-lipped, and pressed her lips to Ben’s. He stared at the bright, white lights reflected in the bright, white linoleum floor. Juliet smiled still. It didn’t reach her eyes, not the smile. Ben could read her alright. He could read her. She wasn’t smiling. She was holding a hammer, twang, twang, twanging nails into a wooden coffin.
“Welcome back.” She smiled once more, long enough for her eyes to drive in one last nail, before standing and walking back out the door. Her words echoed in Ben’s mind, clattering around in his coffin, bouncing off the sides and leaving bruises where they hit.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
Welcome back.
Back to life.
FIN