This is something I've thought about for a while. Inspired by a thread on The Fuselage. Thanks to mrstater, Cassandra, and mydoglikesbeer for the inspiration.

Once again these are not my characters they belong to the creators of LOST. God bless 'em. (More Nadia, please)

The Journey Begins

Chapter 1

In Iraq corruption filtered down from the top. Bribes were commonplace, in the highest echelons of Sadaam's regime and in the lowest ranks of the Guard. At the prison contraband was exchanged more often than money. Cigarettes or a cigar could buy someone five or ten minutes undisturbed with a father, son, or husband about to be executed. A bottle of forbidden wine or liquor might buy an hour or so, more if the guards couldn't resist temptation and drank it. Movie videos, smuggled in from the west, could guarantee the guards would leave you alone indefinitely. Inspections were rare. No one talked because everyone was guilty, and the punishment for all concerned was death, or worse. Sayid was familiar with the game. He had sources for almost anything and had used them liberally since she had been arrested.

He came to her almost every night bringing food, water, and sometimes something to ease the pain of whatever he'd had to do to her that day. He stayed only for minutes at first, just to make sure she was all right and that she would accept what he had brought. Now, though, he was sure that the order to execute her would come any day. She still refused to cooperate, and Omar was running out of patience. So he brought better bribes, and stayed longer.

His mind raced constantly, trying to find a way to prevent the inevitable. His heart raced each time he entered the cell. He could tell she was scared now. "Will it be soon?" She asked him.

"Yes, but..."

She began talking to him then, as he held her, running his hands through her hair. Not about what he wanted to know during the day, but about things she had seen, atrocities committed by Sadaam, his sons, and the guard. Atrocities committed against people he knew. "Our people, Sayid." She kept telling him. Some things he knew about, the rest didn't surprise him. He knew that some of the people he tortured didn't talk because there was nothing to say. They were innocent. She was not totally innocent, that much was clear. But neither was he.

"Do you pray?" She asked him.

"Of course." It was more out of habit than any kind of devotion at this point, but he didn't tell her that.

"What do you pray for?"

A way to save you, and myself, he thought.

"Allah's strength and wisdom, I suppose." He said.

"Are your prayers answered?" She raised her head from his chest to look him in the eye.

"I don't know."

She smiled. "How would you? You aren't sure of what you believe, are you? You know this isn't who you are. I know that much."

"I do what I have to do. I follow orders."

"And when they order you to shoot me?"

He touched her face, kissed her forehead, her cheek, her lips, gently. "That I cannot do."

"How. ?"

He shushed her with another kiss. She opened her mouth to his and the darkness of the cell seemed to close in around them. Eventually she broke away. "I asked how you plan to avoid shooting me."

"I don't know yet." His head was spinning both from the kiss, and from the growing panic that he wouldn't be able to save her in the end.

He stood. "I'd better go." He knew it was close to morning. It was too dangerous to be seen leaving by the next shift of guards. They weren't the ones he had bribed.

"No matter what today brings," He told her, helping her to her feet. "If I am here, don't be afraid. I won't let anything happen to you." He tilted her chin up and looked into her eyes. "Do you trust me?"

"Yes." She said. "I trust you."

After he left, she sat against the wall, pulling her knees up to her chest like she had as a child. Tilting her head back, she let the tears come. When she saw him the day she was arrested she thought perhaps she could use the past to save herself. Falling in love with him again had not been part of the plan. Yet, there it was. In his eyes she saw the same boy she had loved. The same boy she had told her mother she would marry someday.

"Your father would never allow such a thing." Her mother said flatly, referring to his family's lower status.

"Yours did, Mama." Twelve-year-old Nadia had answered.

"Your mouth will get you into trouble one day, daughter." She said, touching the child's smooth cheek as she spoke. "Make sure what you want is worth the price."

How she wished she could feel her mother's touch just once more. She must have dozed off for the cell door opening jarred her awake. Sayid stood there with two guards.

"Get up." He told her. There was none of the softness in his voice that had been there earlier, but she remembered his words: No matter what today brings, if I am here don't be afraid.

He threw a black hood on the floor at her feet. "Put it on."

She did as he told her, hands trembling. I trust him, she said over and over to herself, I trust him.

She allowed herself to be led out of the cell and down the hall, unsure who was holding her arm. Then, his voice, close to her ear. "I'll take it from here." He said. She heard footsteps as the guards walked away. Suddenly the hood was torn off and he pulled her around a corner, crouching down low.

In hushed tones he explained the plan to her. A truck, she could hide in the back, there would be plenty of time to make an escape before it reached the city. She begged him to come with her, but he refused. "It would be even more dangerous for both of us...and my family..." He reached out to touch her face.

"What's going on here?"

Looking up she saw another officer, staring at Sayid and drawing his gun.

"Omar..."Sayid said. Then realizing he had no choice, he shot him. The file the officer was carrying fell to the floor, its contents spilling out.

"Now you have to come, too." She told him. Again he refused and realizing it was no use she hastily grabbed a photo from the scattered papers on the floor, scrawled a message on the back of it and gave it to him.

"Go!" He said to her.

"But, how will you explain..."

"You took my gun and shot us both."

"Both?" Then as she watched, horrified, he took the gun and shot himself in the leg. He grimaced in pain and the gun clattered to the floor. She picked it up. Giving him one last glance, Nadia turned and ran.