Previously on Alias: lodie's daddy was the man in the box. Then he was the man out of the box. Then he wasn't lodie's daddy, but some other dude whose brain was transplanted into lodie's daddy's skull. But none of that's important right now because it's basically not even mentioned throughout this entire episode.
We open on a typical suburban house where a family is enjoying an evening of togetherness around a televised football game. The family consists of a dad, a mom, a teenaged son, and a pre-teen daughter. They're all blond. Yeah, I totally knew they were Rachel's family the second they showed up onscreen. As the Family Rachel chills out, some black-clad figure shows up in the background and disappears quickly. Rachel's mom worries at her husband about how their daughter hasn't called them recently and suddenly the lights go out, the black-clad people move in, and wham! The Family Rachel, it is kidnapped.
Luckily, they're kidnapped by the Apple Store. Rachel watches her family from behind two-way glass as Sydney tries to comfort her with the notion that her family is safer now that they're out of that house, what with all the phone taps and surveillance equipment scattered about the place. The Family Rachel is being put into witness protection and Rachel won't even be able to call them. "How am I supposed to do this alone?" she wonders aloud. "You do it because you don't have a choice," grits the Pregnant Angel of Death to her. "You do it because you want the world to be safe for the ones you love." Way to ease her fears there, Sydney. Syd says that she knows people think she's wack for even continuing to work, but she refuses to sit home and just loaf around eating pinwheels and watching soaps when Vaughn's killer is still out there. Rachel takes strength from this and finally goes in to show her family that she's okay and to explain to them what's going on. Her parents seem understandably concerned, but her sister looks at her like, "Way to go, BITCH." And her brother looks at her like they're not related and he likes her rack. Heh.
Clandestine Meetings of Scummy Men. Sloane is filling in Gordo on the Family Rachel. Sloane tries to act reputable and says that he won't hurt Rachel or anyone else at the Apple Store, that that's not their agreement. Gordo's all, uh, yeah, our agreement is whatever-the-hell I say it is, okay? "Let me say this again," sneers Sloane. "I will not hurt those people." Gordo's all, yeah, whatever, I'm not asking you to. Not yet, at least. Sloane's like, we finished here? "Almost," says Gordo. "Have you heard of a weapons designer named Janos Vak?" Sloane says he hasn't. Gordo says he's disappeared, and tasks Sloane with using Apple Store resources to find him. "What would your colleagues do if they knew you answered to me?" asks Gordo. "That you were betraying them on a daily basis?" "The same thing I hope to do to you one day," snits Sloane. Heh.
“ The Algerian arms dealer is hanging out with his peeps, playingdominos? Oh, no, wait. It's mah jongg. That'san interesting pastime for a bunch of arms mercenaries. What are they, eighty and living in Miami? ”
Apple Store. Later that day, Sloane uses his computer to track down Vak and watches Syd waddle over and talk to Marshall, and he seems to be very regretful about what he's doing. But obviously, he doesn't have a choice, because if he mucks up his deal with Gordo, he'll go back to prison and Nadia (who?) will most likely die. After downloading Vak's info onto the flash drive Gordo gave him, Sloane attends a meeting in the Conference Room of Endless Expositions. Jack states that Sloane, in his position of limited capacity, was tasked with going over Rachel's debriefing. Sloane says that while he went through it, there was only one name that he recognized immediately: Janos Vak.
Vak specializes in targeting software that he calls "lasso technology," and Syd and Marshall jointly pipe up that this software would allow an incoming missile to be electronically intercepted and redirected, essentially "lassoing" it. Sloane says that based on Rachel's statement, Gordo's been trying to locate Vak for the past six months. Jack says that they're going to try to get to Vak first and then use him as bait for Gordo. Sloane brings up that Vak has partnered with an Algerian arms dealer in the past and that they should try to squeeze him for Vak's location. "The Algerian underworld is notoriously hard to penetrate," says Jack. "I think I know someone who can do it," says Syd. "Rene Rienne," says Jack. Who? Oh, you mean lodie. Got it. Jack approves this course of action and tells Syd to get on the horn and see if lodie can get a lead on Vak.
Meeting adjourned, Sloane corners Syd over by her desk and thanks her for the letter of recommendation she wrote for him. He then confesses that every day, he goes to the hospital, talks to Nadia's doctors, but can't set foot in her room. Ron Rifkin does this awesome lip quiver thing that is just barely noticeable, but that indicates just how upset Sloane is about his inability to go to his daughter's bedside. "I can't stand to see her hooked up to all those machines," he says, "knowing that it's my fault she's there." Syd seems genuinely touched by Sloane's confession, and she says that she knows he'll do everything in his power to find a cure for Nadia. "Yes, I will," says Sloane, the tone of his voice indicating that he will, indeed, do absolutely anything to save his daughter, even if that "anything" involves killing a bunch of Apple Store employees. What? You totally know he would. The man has no soul.
Marseille. The Algerian arms dealer is hanging out with his peeps, playingdominos? Oh, no, wait. It's mah jongg. That'san interesting pastime for a bunch of arms mercenaries. What are they, eighty and living in Miami? As they're determining whether to move the East tile or the one with the pretty little purple flower on it, a motorcycle approaches and then crashes right through the door and into their mah jongg game. It's lodie. She gets up and quickly dispatches the dudes with some flashy knife work and a crack or two from her helmet. She fells the arms dealer with a dagger to the leg and then strangles him until he gives up some info on Vak. Andthat's pretty much all we see of lodie for the entire episode. Man. I hope she gets a nice per diem while she's hanging out in Hollywood basically doing a day of work here and an hour of work there.