puppets on strings all dance and sing

[cibosity]

Pulling off a good con required the ability to care or dismiss about things at will. For about five minutes, Sawyer had managed to forget that Richard Alpert was a man who had not aged a day in the span of approximately fifty years, that the Others had significantly more knowledge of the land than he did, that there was still no explanation to be

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[groovytechchick]

Claudia had taken to exploring the island, hoping that maybe she'd end up running into one of the former Supers who were on the island. So far she hadn't had any luck, but she really wasn't planning on giving up on her goal anytime soon.

Bobbing her head to the imaginary beat in her head, Claudia walked as she she first hummed under her breath and then just full out started singing the song that was newly stuck in her head.

"Your performance deserving a standing ovation
And who would have thought it'd be the two of us
So don't wake me if I'm dreaming
'Cause I'm in the mood come on and give it up

You've got me feeling hella good
So let's just keep on danc-"

The lyrics to the song died on her lips as she came upon a cage... With a very pissed off long haired dude stuck inside. "Whooooooooa. Dude, seriously harsh jail time! What the hell did you do to get stuck in here?" she demanded, turning her head a little bit to get a better look at the dude behind the bars.

[cibosity]

If there was anything Sawyer hated more than being outwitted, it was being made a spectacle of. Bad enough that he was caught in a cage, but now he had an audience trundling by and gawking like he was some kind of animal on display. The redhead who stumbled by his cage was unfamiliar to Sawyer, but if he had taken another leap through time after all, then that didn't come as too much of a surprise. It was simply an annoyance that he had gone to such lengths to make space on the island for himself and his group, to earn the trust of those who declared that they wanted the newcomers off the island, only for it to go completely to waste. He kept deathly quiet as the girl walked on by, singing all chirpy like singalong tapes, hoping that she wasn't carrying any sort of tranquilizer in hand. It wouldn't have been the first time.

When she looked just as confused as he did, it only angered him more. Like hell some random chick was going to help him bust out of cage, if she even had the strength to, at that

[groovytechchick]

For a moment, Claudia was totally confused. No one she'd met would just randomly throw people into a cage - JUST BECAUSE. Sure, she hadn't met everyone on the island, but still!!! She couldn't help but stare at him in disbelief - because hello`She was pretty damn sure he wasn't telling the truth.

Her confusion and disbelief quickly turned to annoyance as his gaze washed over her numerous times. Finally having enough of the over-looking she pointed at her face. "My face is here dude, not here," she told him before motioning toward her chest. "They aren't magic and they don't talk. So if you wanna talk to me, quit with the whole eyeballing."

[cibosity]

"I beg to differ," he allowed himself to murmur before pulling his gaze firmly up to Claudia's face. It was easier, from what he had experienced in the past, to have women think that all he was after was a nice view of the hills, rather than to give them any reason to believe that he was looking for more practical reasons. Denial, at best, hurt the part of some women that still longed to preen and pretty up for those they took an interest in. At worst, it pulled the keener sorts to full attention, allowing him to get away with less. So if the quickest way to keep Claudia distracted and believing that he was just some dumb hick was to stare at her rack a little longer, Sawyer was more than willing to oblige. "They're magic to my eyes."

After a pause, he relented with a tilt of his head, letting the hair sweep over with the motion. "And I wanted to check as well as I could to see if you had some keys on ya. Wouldn't be the first time the folks in charge sent a pretty girl my way to try and distract me."

[crossyourpath]

Felicia's been feeling pretty restless which only ever makes her get a little bit reckless. She knows better, always has, but knowing better and doing better are two very different things.

Which is why she's stopped thinking in the first place. It gets too tiring when all it does is cause her to worry and feel bad. Taking a sharp turn, she revs the engine of her bike slightly as she comes around the corner, planning on doing a loop around that cage that just sits there. Making her own course and all of that. It might be wasteful, but she hasn't moved like this in so long that she feels she has earned it.

More than earned it; it's her right.

She's midway through switching gears when she realises that the cage isn't empty like it normally is. No, it's got an occupant and while butting in isn't usually her style she just has to know why. Curiosity, cats, that sort of thing

[cibosity]

Even in the middle of a dark mystery jungle, no longer tied up by a genuine Iraqi but instead shoved unceremoniously into what was once a polar bear cage, Sawyer can appreciate the finer parts of life. Seeing a blonde approach on a bike, one which roars to life more than any of the damn birds and boar that he has grown accustomed to encountering on the island, Sawyer immediately perks up and lets his gaze lazily trail after the newcomer- or, at least, he hopes that's how it comes off, because quite frankly he sees nothing to gain from letting the panic show on his face or in his actions.

But hey, that's new. He's pretty sure he's never seen a motorcycle on the island before, or anything running on gas that looks like it was put together some time after 1974. Maybe he's returned to the good old present, Sawyer thinks, even if it doesn't explain the sudden shift in location, and

[crossyourpath]

Setting her helmet on the seat of her bike, she pulls her gloves off one at a time sliding them into her back pocket. That's a new one, though she can't say no to the comparison. Crime dramas have never been a thing she went looking for, but who hasn't found themselves caught up in a CSI marathon from time to time?

"Maybe," she says shrugging slightly as she walks over the bars. People don't just end up in cages. There is always someone or something that put them there. She should know -- she's been penned up before and it wasn't as nearly as fun as it sounds. There's always a catch. Always something worth getting away from that put you there.

Though one look at this guy tells her that being in a cage hasn't served him wrong. Then again, it'd take a lot more than bars to make him look bad. "But don't you know bad girls love good boys? Unless the bad boys are reformed, then they're twice as fun."

[cibosity]

Never having seen hair quite that white before- at least, on anyone her age and without the use of a wig- Sawyer finds his eyes darting over the strands, watching them catch the sunlight and appear to reflect the rays in full. It completes the effect, somehow, the girl who's all a mix of jet black and bone white, Sawyer's mind automatically wondering how a splash of red might look against her to complete the effect. The fact that they keep on eying one another, purposeful and languid, puts Sawyer more at ease, suddenly set in front of a game that he's played so many times by now.

Hooking his arms onto one of the horizontal bars, he leans out until the cool surface of the bars meet with his skin, sending a brief shiver up his spine that catches in his breath. Soon enough, it molds smoothly into a laugh, or perhaps more accurately a chuckle. Nothing too enthusiastic, because this is a game he never minds having drag on, so long as it's all play.

"Now see, if you were real ambitious," he pointed out with a purposeful glance, "then you'

[gotanymilk]

The polar bear cage that once stood on Hydra Island was located approximately a mile east from where Benjamin Linus had set up shop, though he'd only discovered the proximity in location weeks after the fact. There were, it turned out, limits to amount of information even a man of his skill could procure on short notice, though he would never admit it to; no, like he once told John, he always had a plan, even when things looked particularly dire. Though seeing it for the first time had given him pause, he'd since grown accustomed to its presence, its familiar pointlessness one of many symbols of the life he'd left behind in siding with the Hostiles--the Others, as the survivors of Oceanic 815 had taken to calling his people

[cibosity]

As soon as Sawyer could hear rustling in the distance, he held himself stock still, not even daring to breathe until the person made it through to the clearing. Upon recognizing said person's face, he swore bitterly- no specific expletive so much as a growl and some semblance of syllables spat through his teeth as he rolled his eyes, giving the bars one last hefty shake before he turned around to walk along the perimeter of the cage. If he wasn't getting out anytime soon, the very least he could do was keep the blood pumping through his veins to ward off pins and needles that came with stagnant circulation. He should have been thinking of some damned explanation for what was going on just then, but Sawyer found that he couldn't think through the haze of frustration that settled over him, red and thick, suppressed enough that all he managed was to kick away a significant pebble with his foot

[gotanymilk]

"What's in it for me?" Ben asked, parroting the oft too familiar phrase back at the man who may as well have originated it. Still, there was something wry about the line of his small slash of a mouth, his large eyes held wide as he considered the situation before him. The remark about the Barracks was encouraging, at the very least, its implication being that most of the crash survivors had since moved on from seeing the so-called Others -- and, in particular, Ben -- as the source of all evil. It promised to make his job easier, if only just.

He glanced down at the rock Sawyer had dropped, then returned his attention upwards. "Other than nostalgia, of course, but we've already gone over that, haven't we, James?" he rattled off quickly, cataloging everything about the man's appearance and comparing it with his own memories; he didn't look any older. "Pardon me for saying this, but you don't seem particularly surprised to be here."

[cibosity]

Too many times, Sawyer found himself blurting out half-formed thoughts to Ben without being prompted at all, thoughts which the man quickly pieced together to form a more coherent line than Sawyer might have come up with on his own. Not wanting to give Ben that advantage, the blond forcibly kept his lips pressed tight and jaw clamped shut, not even letting himself move as he tried, once more, to be the one who read others. Ben had always been a slippery little devil as far as Sawyer's comprehension was concerned, pulling stunts that the Alabaman wouldn't have thought of in a million years, that no amount of time in high school or college could have gotten him to understand. But if there was one thing Sawyer could recognize, it was doubt, the sentiment that he had made a living out of erasing in others for so long

[once_invisible]

"And who're we damning today

[cibosity]

The question was so utterly unhelpful, one that Sawyer immediately believed was intended to mock him and his predicament, given the man's sarcastic tone of voice. Plain too, however, in a way that made Sawyer wonder if he was from the Linus family tree, or at the very least one of the many that the crazy Frenchwoman called the 'Others.' Or, as apparently was all the rage in the seventies, one of the 'Hostiles.' Same difference.

"If you ain't careful, I might just add you to the list, carrot-top," Sawyer muttered under his breath, wondering if he had underestimated Alpert and misread the startled look in his lined eyes and how even a man who could pull a Rip van Winkle unscathed could manage a stunt like this one. He hadn't seen this particular redhead standing among those back at a camp, but given that they were thorough enough even to send some of their number deep down into the depths of the ocean, Sawyer didn't think much of it. Until the man started to eye the entirety of the cage like it baffled him as much as it had Sawyer, the

[once_invisible]

"I'm waiting on Ophelia to join me," Skinner replied, nothing if not wry. "And I'm due to deliver a soliloquy in the next hour or so. Big on the nicknames, aren't you, skipper?" Pet names were a habit with him, but not to the extent that he could be called any different from those in his social class in his own time period. Anyone who'd been around him more than once could attest to that.

Stepping up to the bars, he cocked his head to one side, eyes fixing on the lock that Sawyer had previously been trying to break. He'd broken out of worse before, that was for certain, although that thing did look mighty rusty.

"As for helping you out, I think that might depend on what you're in for."

[cibosity]

Either the man was playing dumb, or he wasn't even close to what Sawyer suspected, but worse yet was the fact that Sawyer couldn't figure out for the life of him which he would have preferred. A sense of humor, though, that he could appreciate, even if the situation seemed anything but comical to him from inside the cage itself.

"You ain't got a problem with that, right? Think of it as a term of endearment, if you wanna," Sawyer volleyed back, still keeping a close eye on the man as he eyed the lock, looking as though he really was considering helping Sawyer out. While the blond was pretty sure that he could worm his own way out with time and a patient hand, time was valuable, and he'd prefer to waste as little of it as possible. "As for doin' sudden time, you'd know as well as I what it's for. I'm pretty sure that doin' so much as sneezin' the wrong way on the island can land you in a cage."

[tricksthetreat]

She was running. Trixa hated running, but without her supernatural physique she needed the exercise to stay fit so every so often she laced up the sneakers she'd salvaged - cursing the bright pink and green she'd been gifted with - and headed out of her hut. She rarely planned her routes, it wasn't as if she could go very far and consequently she wasn't exactly sure where she was when she stumbled upon one of the island's stranger quirks.

A man in a cage. Why there was a cage, or who the man was were separate issues, all wrapped up in her general problem which could be summed up succinctly...

"What the fuck?"

Breathing heavily, she approached the cage and peered inside.

[cibosity]

When Sawyer heard the approach of footsteps from the distance, regular and light, the steps of someone who ran on a regular basis and knew how best to do so when aiming to make the most out of a brief period of time, he fell silent. The bars on the cage continued to hum slightly from being jolted, all of the vibration quickly dying down as he stepped back from the bars, hating the part of him that worried about what was approaching from down that path. Fear did him no good. It ripped all the sense from his person and made him act on instinct, which frankly wasn't half as helpful to him as the skills he had gradually acquired over time and by watching the people around him

[tricksthetreat]

Trixa had to stand and stare at the man for a long minute, racking her brain to try and remember if she'd used that alias with this face before. There certainly wasn't any hint that he was confused, or making something up and for a moment she actually turned and looked over her shoulder like someone else was standing there. It was the strangest thing.

"Sorry, guy, pretty sure I'm not... not who you think I am."

She walked around to the front of the cage, still catching her breath and looking for some way to let the guy out. It was amusing, and kinda funny, but she was pretty sure he didn't want to stay there.

"So, you lock yourself in cages often, stranger?"

[cibosity]

"Quit this 'stranger' business, muchacha," he growled under his breath, voice more of a rumble than anything else. Ana Lucia had never really been the type to fuck around- other than quite literally- but there was just no damned way that the woman standing in front of him wasn't her. Everything was familiar. The smirk, the downward sloping eyes that carried with them a look that wasn't quite lazy, but languid anyway. Always funny, because it was the opposite of how she was. Back to the point, though, he just couldn't think of any other possibility to explain the phenomenon in front of him, not unless the Others had managed to fashion a perfect cloning device.

"I get that sleepin' with a guy don't mean next to nothin' anymore," Sawyer continued, stepping to the very edge of the cage and trying to get a better look at her, as though he'd be able to see that she was just kidding, or that she was purposely hiding what she knew because there was someone watching. "But this is a little cold, ain't it? Even for you."