Pick up the pieces and go home.

[broken_brushes]

Four and a half years I'd been on the island. I'd lived and loved, I'd built something I was proud of, I'd cried and carried on. But only once had I ever come across a mysterious item from home, and over time, I'd forgotten that I, too, could be the target of anything so explicitly cruel

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[a_swan_diver]

Bella'd come over to the Compound on a futile attempt to find something other than her current cut-offs and tshirt to wear - something other than the minidresses and insane heels the box kept hurling at her. She did, at least, manage another pair of shorts. Though the plaid wasn't quite her style, she'd take it.

That's when she hear the coffee cup hit the floor and walked over, putting a hand to Shari's shoulder.

"Shari?"

[broken_brushes]

Bella was still new enough that I didn't know her all that well, but she reminded me not only of my need to keep it together, but of Jacob, which made a difference. The hand on my shoulder briefly startled me, but I was quick enough in collecting myself, and glanced down to my damp feet. The mug had fallen to rest just beneath the exam table, its handle snapped off and contents pooled around my sandals.

"Crap," I replied, but managed what I hoped was at least a somewhat encouraging smile when I looked up to Bella. "I'm fine, I'm okay," I swore. "Could you do me a favor and go grab a towel from the kitchen?"

[a_swan_diver]

"Sure," Bella readily agreed. She hurried to the kitchen then back again, automatically mopping up the liquid. She stood up when the spot on the floor was dry then looked between Shari and the table she was pretty sure wasn't there when she'd arrived. "This is one of those freaky island things, isn't it? Like the carnivals from nowhere, and stuffed animals that come to life?"

[broken_brushes]

"Oh, you didn't have to clean it up," I said, but there had been little enough down there that there wasn't time for me to do much of anything but pick up the mug and its handle before she'd finished. "Thank you, and yes, it is a freaky island thing." I dropped the handle into the empty cup with a clank and looked back to the table. "It's mine, from home."

[youlosetrack]

This isn't the view he's expected when leaving the quiet of his room to get some food, but Mace has realized he can't really except anything anymore. Not after he's had to fend off murderous teddy bears or soothe crying pregnant women in the only way he can.

He pushes the sleeves of his sweatshirt up before walking over to Shari. He doesn't say a word once he's by her side, just looks down at the table, taking everything in before he puts together a picture of what he might be looking at. He misses the name tag entirely.

"What am I looking at, here?"

[broken_brushes]

I couldn't tell you how, but I knew it was Mace and not Steve without even looking. Maybe he gave off a vibe or something; as an ex-ghost, it definitely wouldn't be the weirdest thing I'd heard of. I just know that when he stepped up, something let go in my chest, and for a moment I didn't know whether I wanted to cry in relief or not.

I didn't, for the record.

"Imagine me," I began, calm as you please, stretching my hands out over the table. "Head there, feet there. They wrapped my head so my family wouldn't have to see."

[youlosetrack]

"You told me you'd died," he replies, picturing a body on the gurney for a second before dismissing the image. He has enough trouble with dealing with the living without having to imagine someone he likes dead, as well. "What's it doing here?"

[broken_brushes]

"The island." It was the most simple and apt explanation I had. So much could be folded into those two words, but I clarified anyway. "Sometimes things from home randomly turn up, just like we do. My headstone is out in the jungle near my house."

[cpt_invincible]

Nathan's got a bite of a sandwich in his mouth when he passes the rec room, and while he hadn't planned on going in, it's the medical table that he doesn't remember being there that draws him in. There's always some weird shit happening, and at least from the looks of this, it doesn't seem like he'll end up with some fucked up looking carnival prize hanging off of his arm.

"Who died?" he asks, mouth still half full of bread and cheese.

[broken_brushes]

"Me." I afforded Nathan a quick glance, and crazy as it probably sounds, I was glad that he seemed so unfazed. Back home, I'd come to accept my death, to be practical about it. There hadn't really been a choice. I didn't doubt that there was a message meant for me in all this, but it didn't mean I had to become an emotional mess over it.

[cpt_invincible]

"Sorry, man," Nathan says, because he knows how annoying it is when that happens.

"It's a bitch, isn't it? How'd you go? Last time for me, it was the old... well, you know," he makes a gun shape out of his fingers and pretends to fire one at the side of his head. Had my head savagely beaten into a sink before that, though."

Honestly, Barry'd dodged a bullet there. Maybe the smiley, popular girl hadn't been the one to do him in, but her dad had been a nutter.

[broken_brushes]

Yes, I did know, having seized the gun from Nathan's hand myself the day of his arrival. Idly, I wondered if he felt as drawn back to the blood and graymatter sprayed inside that plexiglass cube as I did to what was inside the towel wadded up at the end of the table.

"I was pushed off a fourth floor balcony and hit a concrete patio," I answered. "I was lucky, I didn't feel anything." I dragged my eyes from the towel and looked curiously at Nathan. "How many times was it, for you?"

[niceofyoutoask]

Lipton approached quietly, coming to stand beside Shari. If the unusual metal table wasn't a key indicator that something was wrong, the look on Shari's face would be. "Hey," He looked at her, noticing vaguely a woman singing from the jukebox. "Everything alright?" She was still Luz's wife to him, and it would go against everything he was made of not to be concerned.

[broken_brushes]

As long as I'd known Lipton, he'd been one of the most unfailingly kind people in my aquaintance, possibly only outdone by his wife. It had been long enough that the mere sight of him didn't remind me of George anymore, but I would be lying if I said I hadn't felt a familiar sting that day when I looked up to him with a weary smile.

"Yeah," I promised, rallying myself. "Just a little bit of a shock, that's all. I'm okay."

[niceofyoutoask]

He nodded, even if he didn't quite believe that last bit. He wouldn't press the the matter, if she didn't want to talk about something. Looking back at the table, he caught site of the toe tag for the first time, and things clicked into place. "Ah," he'd never been in a morgue, but he knew the basics as well as anybody did. "Yeah, I think that'd be a pretty good shock for anybody." Especially one who knew as much about her own mortality as Shari did.

[broken_brushes]

"It's not really the table that's such a shock, just not expecting it," I explained, glancing back to the wadded-up towel. "I think maybe someone is trying to tell me something."

Too readily I'd forgotten the gift of the life I'd been living. Too easily I'd fallen into the arms of mortality.

[heretofight]

To be honest, three days on and the island wasn't any less weird to him than it had been in those first few hours. There was a heavy kind of sadness to it. Even the people fool enough to settle down and try to move on with their lives were stuck in some kind of bizarre holding pattern. Waiting for the final shoe to drop.

It gave him the creeps.

So, he'd been skulking around in the rec room when she'd walked in, bruises livid on his face and his arm in a makeshift sling. She looked like she'd seen a ghost, which was what he noticed long before it dawned on him how beautiful she was.

Hovering by the bookcase, he considered just leaving her be, but finally, he cleared his throat and said, "Uh, hey... You all right?"

[broken_brushes]

I should have known his name. That was the first thought to enter my head when I opened my eyes again and focused them on the mountain of a man peering concernedly at me from across the room. He was new, I should have known his name. I blinked away my reverie and tilted my head in resignation.

"Something like," I replied, fingers bunching in the sheet. "You're new."

[heretofight]

"You guys all just know each other, or is it really that obvious?" Everybody took one look at him and knew, and from the outside, he couldn't figure out what the hell it was that made him so different. Maybe he just looked lost, which might've been embarrassing, if he really gave a shit.

"And 'xcuse me for saying, but you don't really look all right."

[broken_brushes]

"I'm on the Council, I make it a point to know." I wondered if anyone had told him about Eames yet, now that I could see the obvious likeness. At least there would be no trouble telling them apart; this guy was huge.

"I'm alive," I replied to his second remark, my smile reaching my eyes more than my mouth. "What's your name?"