Fic: Hansel (ep. 1x11)

[amproof.livejournal.com]

Hi there. :)

This is my first post to this community. I've never done Lost fic before, and this is more of a character study than a fic. Even so, I humbly offer it.

Title: Hansel
By: amproof
About: Lost
Rating: None
Archive: Ask.
Thanks: To sanspantalons for the beta.
Spoilers: 1 x 11 "All the best cowboys have daddy issues"
Summary: He always thought living on a tropical island would be like living in a fairy tale. No one told him that the Brothers Grimm wrote it.
Disclaimer: "Lost" is the property of JJ Abrams and ABC. No infringement is intended by my blatantly taking characters that I did not create and then sticking thoughts into their heads.



All his life he has wanted to be good. When he was a boy, he prayed for it, and mostly he was. Then there was the drug thing and that lasted too long. It made him selfish and cruel, but all the while he knew it wasn't him. Deep down, he knew he was good. He just couldn't grab hold of it. It was slippery, like catching a fish with his hands. He could do it if he just stood still long enough, moved fast enough. He's over the drugs now, thank God, except that he hasn't actually thanked God yet, hasn't thanked Him since before the drugs. Didn't think to thank Him when the plane fell and he walked out unscathed (too preoccupied with saving his stash), didn't think to thank Him when he threw his stash away.

And he certainly isn't thanking Him now. What he is doing is trying to be good. He promised he would take care of Claire, and he will. Claire cannot run, and he will not leave her. He tries to fight, but he is only small, and he was never a scrapper. Ethan dismisses any illusions he had about winning a fight with a single punch to his face. "Do what you're told, Charlie," Ethan says. Charlie remembers that sometimes being good means being obedient. He knows this from when he was a boy. The Church teaches it.

Ethan hits him again.

Charlie's eyes water.

"You don't see anything. You don't hear anything. You understand me?"

"I don't see anything. I don't hear anything," he says. "Yeah. I got it." He can see Clare in front of him. He can hear her crying. Ethan's fist slams into the back of his head. He falls to his knees. Ethan kicks him in the back and he falls on his face. Claire screams. She attacks Ethan, and he throws her down. "You don't want anything to happen to that baby, you watch yourself," Ethan says.

"Please, Claire, stay away," Charlie yells. She makes her choice, the baby over Charlie. Ethan grabs Charlie's hair, bending over him and spitting hate like a drill sergeant in a Pat Conroy novel.

"You don't see anything. You don't hear anything. Understand me?"

"I don't see anything. I don't hear anything," he says with his face in the grass. Too fast, much too fast, Ethan kicks him in the side. He groans and tries to curl into himself.

"You don't see anything. You don't hear anything."

"I don't see anything. I don't hear..." He is kicked before he can finish. He lies, sobbing, as Ethan says it again, and he repeats it and is kicked again and Ethan says it, and he repeats it and is kicked until he realizes he is not being kicked.

He is being punished.

If he can hear nothing, how can he hear Ethan's command? The only correct answer is no answer at all. Ethan speaks to him, and he is silent.

"Get up," Ethan says.

He starts to rise and is immediately punished for it. The pain roars in his ears, and suddenly he is not pretending anymore. He hears nothing. He sees nothing. 'Be good', he thinks. 'Just, for the love of God, be good and you'll be alright.'

When he stands, it is because Ethan has lifted him by the back of his pants and set him on his feet. He keeps his eyes down. He can hear a high moan that might be the wind, or it might be Claire. It seems far away and barely breaks through the pain that is filling his mind. A rope is slid over his head. He is tugged forward.

"You're cattle now, boy. Move along," says Ethan, though Charlie does not hear him. His eyes are on the ground. His ears are empty.

His fingers grip each other as if they can comfort themselves. They tug and pull. He drops the first bandage accidentally. He watches it fall. It just happens to be in his line of sight. Or non-sight, since he has given up seeing. Something wakes in his brain, just a little, and then he starts dropping them on purpose. He is walking in a fairytale. Hansel, he thinks, was small, too.

Others join their merry trio as they go deeper into the forest. He does not see them. He does not hear them. He merely feels them. He begins thinking of them as *they*. They ignore him. They only want Claire. They chatter about her baby. This is clear even in his hazy state. He is nothing more than baggage. Collateral. The rope around his neck slackens and he stops. He thinks they are deciding which path to take. He has one bandage left. The 'E' is everything now. It changes 'fat' to 'fate', which is fitting because food and survival are his two favorite topics of late. Hansel, he remembers, was saved in the end by his clever sister. He likes Claire, but he does not think she is clever, not like Gretel. He must save them both. He played hero once, saved the doctor. He will find a way to do it again. While he waits with his eyes closed, as is his habit since he was given another beating at the first stop, he pushes his foot into the dirt, making the print as deep as he can. He will not risk dropping the 'E' when They could be watching.

A dirty, stinking piece of black cloth is tied over his eyes. It burns. "End of the line, Charlie," Ethan says. Charlie does not understand the words. Ethan removes the rope from Charlie's neck and replaces it with a noose of twisted vines.

Charlie waits dumbly. He is pulled to his toes, still waiting, and then off his feet. Slowly, he is lifted into the air. Above him, Ethan and They cinch the vine up the branch like a pulley. His legs kick uselessly. His senses come back to him in a rush. He panics, but it is too late. Everyone is gone. On the path, he chose to hear nothing when he should have been cataloging every snapped twig, every sound of water. Now the only sound is the soft rustle of his own body swaying from a tree branch.

He only ever wanted to be good.

Failure is a fact of his life.

It is too hard to breathe. As he passes out, he prays for the first time since he doesn't remember when. The prayer is this: God. God. God.