He was still curled up in her arms, when she woke up the next morning. Her head ached, and her neck was stiff, and she knew she was slowly getting as sick as he was. Billy was already awake, she thought, he was lying very still and looking at her; and then she gave a small scream as she realized that his eyes were open, and he wasn't breathing. He had died in her arms in the night. She was alone now.
She sat there looking at him for a long time, huddled next to him, not knowing what to do, and not wanting him to leave her. She sat crying, hugging her knees and rocking back and forth. She knew she had to do something with him, to’ take him away, or bury him, but she couldn't bear for him to leave her.
She pulled him slowly outside that afternoon, and dug a shallow grave with her hands, in the thicker sand near the rocks, and she laid him there. And all she could think of as she did was his telling her not long before that he wanted to end his life on an island. He had. But that all seemed so long ago. It was part of another life, in a place she would never see again. She knew that now. She knew she was going to die like Billy.
She kneeled down next to him, and looked at him, with his eyes closed, and his freckles so big on the thin face, and she touched his cheek for a last time, and stroked his hair.
“I love you, Billy,” she said as she had the night before. But this time he didn't answer, and she covered him gently with sand and left him.
She sat alone in the cave that night, hungry and cold and shaking. She hadn't eaten all day. She was too sick to eat, and too sad about Billy. And she hadn't drunk water either. And the next morning, she felt weak and confused and she kept thinking she heard her mother calling her. Whatever she had, it was killing her, just as it had killed Billy. She wondered how long it would take, or if it even mattered. There was nothing left to live for now. Chris was gone. Billy was gone. Nick was lost to her… her marriage was over… she had crashed Desmond's plane… she had let everyone down… she had failed them.
She staggered out to the beach and fell down several times, and she was too weak to go up to the rocks and get water. She didn't care anymore. It was too much trouble to stay alive. And there were so many people talking to her now. She saw the sun come out, and she heard them, and as she stood up again, she saw a ship on the horizon. It was a very big ship, and it was coming closer. But it didn't matter, because they would never see her.
The USS
The
“What is that, sir?” he asked an officer next to him, who smiled. “It looks like a scarecrow,” It did, from that angle, in the distance. Part of it had gone down, but there was so little left that the skeleton managed to stay afloat, and with another look, the officer gave a series of rapid orders.
“Could it be the plane that O'Malley and Nolan were flying, sir?” the junior officer asked excitedly.
“I don't think so. They went down about five hundred miles from here, give or take a few miles. I don't know what that thing is. Let's take a closer look.”
They advanced slowly on it, and several more of the men focused binoculars on it, but when they got there, the skeleton eluded them, and dipped in and out of the water. But it was obvious now that it was part of a plane. Half the cockpit was still there, and one of the wings had been blown off. The other had burned down to the frame and melted.
“What does it say?” one of the men was shouting to the other.
“Get some men in the water now,” an officer commanded. “I want that brought aboard.” And half an hour later, they had the remains of Cassie's plane spread out on the deck around them. There wasn't much left, but there was one piece that told it all. They had found it. It was painted bright green and yellow. Those had been her colors, they all knew, and the script read
