title: Orphan Son
rating: PG-13
pairing: None, gen.
other characters: Ben Linus, Roger Linus, Richard Alpert
summary: Benjamin Linus has had enough. The death of Roger Linus, as seen from Ben's perspective.
word count: 1,629
setting: Ben's flashbacks from 3-20 "The Man Behind the Curtain", first person.
warnings: for character death, but you knew that already...

That afternoon, sitting in the van, was probably the first time my father really looked at me. Normally, he never looked my way at all. He seemed to intentionally avoid glancing in my direction, even on those long, bright tropical nights when we both paced the darkened house, unable to sleep for the frangipani scent of the flowers, the thrum of insects in the nearby wood, the crush of grass beneath the boots of the Hostiles, biding their time at the edge of our sonar fence. If anything, his eyes were fixed firmly in the past, looking back endlessly to the day of my mother's death -- the day my birth killed her; that I killed her, in his estimation -- and refusing to see, or even think, of the present at all. Days stretched out bleak before him: rise and shine at seven, breakfast with the aging hippies that had once decorated us with their sweet-scented leis, then off to work. Work-man, he was. "Work all day", he liked to say, complaining constantly as he stared into the depths of his beer cans and saw only black. "Working for nothing on some god-forsaken island". We both knew the game, played it well. Nobody was supposed to remind him that he was a useless son of a bitch, and that the Dharma Initiative position was the best thing to ever happen to him in his whole sorry life. Couldn't ever remind him that without the benevolence of Horace, he'd be unemployed and homeless, probably starving. Speaking the truth, that was against the rules.

Leaning back against his seat, he cracked open yet another white can, the black label of which proclaimed it beer. His eyes, bottle-green, studied me as I too sat back, holding, but not drinking from, the can he'd given to me. He was an old man by then; not so much in years as in spirit. Any vitality he might had possessed at some point had been drained away long ago. It had poured out of him along with my mother's blood, and when she stopped, and died, he did too. All that was left was the shell of a man, barely capable of menial tasks, reliably drunk on the couch by six each night. By then, it had been years since I'd gone and left him to it. Something in me had died too, years before. When I came in and found him there, night after night after endless summer night, I left him where he lie. There was no more delicacy, no doting on the father from the son. Let him sleep in his boots, what did I care? I had grown up by then, enough to know that nothing I did would ever change the man.

"Do you really blame me?" I asked him, and my voice nearly cracked as I spoke those words, the most vulnerable moment I had ever experienced since that day I'd gone running through the jungle, looking for the ghost of my mother, and ran into Richard dressed in dun-coloured rags. Richard's eyes had been warm, devoid of recriminations or harsh judgments. The original encounter had been brief, just moments, but it had given me hope, and, after that, my need for my father's approval, that desire I had once felt for him to be happy with me, to be proud of me, and to love me, had all but vanished.

As usual, I got no straight answer, and no apology. Not that it would have mattered, I'm sure. His destiny -- what a magical word, destiny -- came to an abrupt halt that afternoon. Would I have changed my mind, if he had turned soft and sentimental, and poured out the long-withheld fatherly affection a part of me still craved? No, probably not. Time had built that hatred brick by brick, and no words he could have spoken would have eased or erased the numerous horrid memories that rose whenever I considered my childhood and the way he was.

Tipping back his head, he poured the beer down his throat. What sat before me was a wreck of a man, a worthless ruin. The shirt, emblazoned with his name, Roger, and that hated label of his occupation, flapped, too large on a frame that had dried up like bones in a desert. He was weak, and I finally saw it -- weak inside as out. Gone was the terror of my youth, the tall man who staggered through my house like a monster in a waking dream. I finally saw him for what he was: a man reduced by bitter regret, a man with nothing to live for, even if I were to grant mercy and spare him his life.

"If it makes you feel any better, I will do my best to remember your birthday next year," he said wearily, without resolve. Alcoholic promises, as fickle as dandelion seeds on the breeze. He spoke the words like accepting some miserable burden, as though recalling a simple date once a year and speaking a few words to his son, perhaps offering a small token for a gift, was far to much to ask.

Something broke inside me, then. "I don't think that's going to happen, Dad," I said.

Slow and stupid, he looked at the dashboard, unblinking. "What do you mean?"

"You know, I've missed her too," I told him, unzipping the shoulder bag I'd carried along. The gas mask was in there, nestled alongside the change of clothes and the old wooden doll, the one from Annie. My fingers grazed it, gingerly. So many times I'd handled it, the wood was worn down smooth, incapable of producing splinters. "Maybe as much as you have," I continued, voice slightly tremulous, though of course, I did not cry. Over the years, I had learned not to waste my tears on that man, and slowly, I had evolved to hide my emotions, not to wear them on my sleeve the way I had as a child, a sensitive young man.

My eyes focused on the scenery behind the dusty windshield. Everything was bright outside, perfectly peaceful, the lush tall grasses gently swaying in the mild ocean breeze, the salt tang air flowing through the rainy wonder that was our mystical jungle. I could see it all, my dominion.

"But the difference is, for as long as I can remember, I've had to put up with you," I told him, placing particular emphasis on the last word, as the tattered remnants of love I had once felt for the man beside me fell away. Thinking of the verbal abuse I had taken as I child, I shook my head slightly, gritting my teeth. "And doing that required a tremendous amount of patience."

"Goodbye, Dad," I said after a few seconds, as my father goggled at me, too lost in the alcohol stupor to understand the extreme amount of danger he had found himself in. Reaching for the gas mask, I pulled it out of the bag and immediately covered my face with it, my heart pounding as I inhaled the scent of the leather and plastic. Too drunk, perhaps, to run, or maybe just too stupid to understand, my father gaped at me as I withdrew the canister. My breathing quickened as I held it, surprisingly weighty, externally cool. Under the mask, I wet my lips, pausing only a moment. There was never a second where I second-guessed myself, or took a pang of pity for my father beside me, one hand loosely clutching his dented beer can. Thinning hair, colourless as seen out of the corner of my eye, framed my father's face as he watched me. The wrinkled face never betrayed even a hint of comprehension, not even as I slipped my index finger through the tab and yanked, releasing a stream of gas throughout the aged van and into my father's lungs. Words cannot describe the relief I felt when I pulled that tab, and though there was consideration as to my father's ultimate fate, I cannot claim with any degree of sincerity that I felt an ounce of regret.

Blood burst from his nose, as he took the first breath of the poisoned air. The gas entered his body, burning through the fragile tissues of his nostrils as it roared toward his brain. Clouding his lungs, it caused him to cough, and I could hear him struggling against it even as blood splattered across his hands, evidence of the damage inflicted by a simply inhalation. Human enough not to watch, I stared through the smudgy lens of my mask, my gaze fixed on trees in the distance, where black smoke played somewhere amongst the shadows. My thoughts were not on the man flapping his hands at my side, rapidly strangling, but on Richard and the rest and, too, on my mother as I seen her in those brief encounters, fresh and young and dressed in blue. Perhaps I smiled, just a hint, beneath the mask before I moved on to more serious reflections.

After a pathetic attempt at a struggle, my father finally succumbed. Dark maroon blood was smeared across his hands and spilled down his face and shirt. His lank hair hung down, bedraggled from the short-lived fight, and he had dropped his can of beer, which lay, dented, at his feet, slowly leaking beer onto the floor mat and his shoes. Those eyes of his had turned dull and glassy, sightless. Goodbye, Dad, I thought, rather sarcastically, and then it was time for me to go. I climbed out of the van, pushing through a collection of long, wavy fronds and hip-high grass, back to the Dharma housing structure, to Richard, to my destiny.