Orientation

Desmond's working on the computer while Jack pesters him, asking him if he's in contact with the people who made the film. "Do you think I'd be here if I was?" says Desmond, not even looking up. Jack wants to know how it's possible Desmond doesn't know about the crash, about the survivors. "I push this button every 108 minutes. I don't get out much," is the reply. Yeah, and what's the deal with the replacements? Well, Kelvin died waiting for them. Okay, we get it: Jack's a skeptic. We understand. After a couple more questions designed to point out to Desmond how silly this all is, Jack just finally erupts and asks Desmond if he's ever considered that this whole thing, the hatch and the button, everything, is an experiment. A mind game. That's kind of what I ask myself from time to time watching this show, you know. Desmond finally looks right at him. "Every single day," he says. "And for all our sakes, I hope it's not real. But the film says this is an electromagnetic station. And I don't know about you, brothah, but every time I walk past that concrete wall out there, my fillings hurt." The timer flips to forty-nine minutes.

Desmond puts the cover back on the computer, says "all right," and flicks the switch. The hole is momentarily plunged into darkness, before being bathed in faint yellow backup light. "Oh no," says Desmond. Yeah, that's putting it mildly. Locke comes running in. He has a box of popcorn and a Coke, but apparently the concession stand was out of Twizzlers. "What happened?" he asks, and Desmond says, "It's over!" which, thanks to my love of Rocky, forces me to yell, "Nothing is ovah!" Desmond goes running into the pantry. I hope he's not looking for those chocolate bars, or he's going to be pissed. Desmond starts stuffing a backpack full of supplies. "Are you going?" asks Locke. Desmond doesn't even bother to answer, but, to be fair, it was a pretty stupid question. , Desmond goes for some of that stuff he was shooting into his arm in the first episode (we also spot a book called The Third Policeman, which I've read, and I encourage you to do so, and to do this: read the first word on pages four, eight, fifteen, sixteen, twenty-three, and forty-two. It's worth it, I promise). Locke says Sayid's coming to fix the computer. "Give him my best," says Desmond pleasantly.

Desmond goes running down the hall to the front door, with Locke chasing him. Jack follows a little more slowly, after spotting a photograph of Desmond with a woman in front of a city skyline. It's a city I don't recognize, but I can tell you that, since there's more than one tall building, it's not my hometown. Locke says Desmond can't leave, and asks where he's going to go. "As far as I can run, brothah," he says, and he's gone. Jack comes , completely ignoring Locke freaking out, asking Jack what they should do. "Nothing. We do nothing. It's not real. None of it is real," he says. Jack's leaving too. "This wasn't supposed to happen!" wails Locke. Jack pauses long enough just to say, "What was supposed to happen?" He's just as much a dick about it as you can imagine, but adds, for good measure, "Bye, John. You're on your own." He closes the door behind him.

Locke's sitting in his car outside the gates of one kidney-stealing birth father. He watches a security guard meander along, which I guess is why he didn't notice his dad, Cooper, who is not exactly a ninja, sidle up and open the passenger-side door and get in the car. "Morning," he says. Locke stares for a moment before saying "morning" as well. Cooper says that he knows Locke likes to drive around his neighbourhood, and every so often he likes to park outside Cooper's house. Given that Locke drives a rather inconspicuous cherry-red Volkswagen Beetle, I'm guessing he wasn't too concerned about being noticed. Cooper says he figured that would end when he moved (is this a different walled compound? Lost couldn't use the same set again?), but here's Locke again. Cooper says he admits that at first he thought it was funny, but now it's just annoying: "So how about you tell me what the hell it is you want?" Locke thinks about it for a moment before asking why. "Excuse me?" says Cooper. Locke repeats it. Cooper stares at him with scorn and hate and disgust all together. Not surprisingly, Locke can't hold Cooper's hateful gaze. "There is no why," says Cooper, who then asks if Locke thinks he's the first person who ever got conned. "You needed a father figure, I needed a kidney. And that's what happened. Get over it," says Cooper. He starts to open his door before adding, "And John? Don't come back. You're not wanted." No kidding. Cooper gets out; Locke has himself a good cry.

Desmond's running around the compound, scrabbling through shelves, riffling through books. Kate's still got the rifle trained on him, and Locke says he doesn't think she needs that, and on his say-so, Kate lowers the gun. Locke asks Desmond if he can help. "Can you fix a computer?" says Desmond, and Locke is forced to shrug, so Desmond snaps that Locke can't help, then. Kate helpfully points out that Sayid can fix a computer, so Locke tells her to go get him. Jack asks if she can get back up the shaft, and she says there's gotta be a front door in the place, looking expectantly at Desmond, who tells her, "Down the corridor to the left," and then "Be persistent. The wheel sticks." Kate takes off down the hall, finds the door, and sure enough, the wheel sticks, but with a little effort she gets it to turn.

Meanwhile, Desmond's all "found it!" and has his paws on a little jar of...bolts? I guess? Hard to tell. He goes running back to the computer, sets the jar down, and gets to work. Jack, who has traded in his handgun for Desmond's rifle, picks up the jar and points the rifle at Desmond. "Now, you're going to tell me what's going on." Locke tries to say that they don't have the time, and Jack says they're going to take a timeout. If Desmond wants to get to work, he's going to tell Jack how he got here. It was three years ago, says Desmond. He was on a solo race around the world. "My boat crashed into the reef and then Kelvin came," yells Desmond (he's yelling this entire time, because he is both crazy and panicked). "Kelvin?" prompts Locke. Desmond says this Kelvin came running out of the jungle, told Desmond to come with him, and brought him into the compound. First thing he did was teach Desmond to enter the code when the beeping goes off to make it stop. "'What was all that about?' I say. 'Just saving the world,' he says." You're not going to believe this, but Jack looks skeptical. "Saving the world," he says. "His words, not mine," says Desmond. "So I started pushing the button too. And we saved the world together for a while, and that was lovely." Hee. But then Kelvin died, and poor Desmond was left all alone. Yes, but do you have two kidneys? "THE END!" yells Desmond. Jack gives him back his jar of computer parts, and the timer clicks down to eighty-four minutes. Jack walks away as Desmond gets back to work.

Locke's still hanging around, and Jack's all, don't tell me you believe this crap. "You think that makes sense? Pushing a button? You're just going to take his word for it?" says Jack, and Locke says, "His word is all we have, Jack," whatever that's supposed to mean. Desmond says they don't have to take his word for it: "Watch the film." Jack's all, what? "Bookcase, top shelf, behind Turn of the Screw," says Desmond. Sure -- that, he knows the precise location of. Important jar of crucial computer-fixing parts required to stave off apocalypse? That he has to hunt for. Jack just stares at him, while Locke heads for the bookcase. Jack follows. Finding Turn of the Screw, he throws it on the floor (ow! The unreliable narrator is getting trampled!) and reaches behind, pulling out a metal film canister with the Dharma logo on it. On the side is a label: "Orientation." Hence the episode title!

Back on the beach, Hurley's playing with Vincent. Oh, so the dog came back? And Shannon is NOT WATCHING HIM again? Good to know. Also, it's morning now? How long has everybody been down the hatch? He spots Sayid carting some luggage across the sand. Looks like the Lostaways are setting back up on the beach. Hurley scurries -- and you might not think a man his size can scurry, but that is what he does -- over to help. "Dude, I didn't think we were going to get through the night. And I wasn't even here for the...baby-stealing part." Sayid dryly assures him it was quite exciting. Hurley says it's great that things are finally returning to "normalness." Huh? It's the day after he went on an expedition to get dynamite that got Arzt blowed up real good, and the reason for the dynamite was so they could blow open a hatch to use as shelter from the Others, who may or not still be coming. And Jack and Locke had a big fight about it, and now you'd think Jack, Locke, and Kate are nowhere to be found. And things are returning to "normalness," according to Hurley. I suppose the only reason he says that is so he can be all annoyed when Kate comes running up screaming Sayid's name, thus throwing everything "back" into chaos. "Sayid, we need your help," she says.

Back in the Others' pits, Sawyer seems to have forgotten that Jin speaks no English, or at least no more English than is necessary for pivotal scenes or show-ending cliffhangers, because he's asking Jin what the Others did to him, and how many there are, that sort of thing. Jin is at least able to communicate that he was blindfolded, so he can't be of much help. "There could be a hundred of them up there!" says Sawyer. This is where you need a Bruce Willis-type action hero to smirk and say, "My kind of odds."

Sawyer asks for a boost up so he can get them out of there. Jin and Michael help Sawyer get up (yeah, of the three guys in the pit, send up the guy who's got only one usable arm) and he grabs the bars (made of small trees, looks like) providing most of the security. "They've got it weighted down with something." He feels around. "It's tied on somewhere." His exploration is cut short when a huge knife is shoved through the bars, surprising Sawyer, who falls to the floor of the pit.

It's Otherbisi, who glares at them through the bars, which he then lifts up, and then dumps out the netting he has, which contains another person, who falls into the pit with them. She's out cold, and our heroes examine her. "It's a girl!" says Michael, kind of thrilled, like this prison ain't so bad if they provide you with co-ed roommates and they don't have to resort to buggery. I'm sure Augustus has had enough of that. Indeed, it's Michelle Rodriguez, last seen drunkenly flirting with Jack in an airport lounge.

Back in the hatch-hole, Jack and Locke are setting up their little filmstrip while Jack interrogates Locke about what was going on down here before he showed up. "Kate was tied up, Desmond had a gun on me. I think you pretty much caught the gist of it." Will that be all, Dad? Locke says Desmond had all kinds of questions about the Lostaways, like were any of them sick. "You didn't ask anything about him?" says Jack, who could think maybe about saying just one thing without a sneer in his voice. "He was the one with the gun," points out Locke. Jack says Locke seems calm for someone who thinks the world's going to end in forty-five minutes. "He'll fix it," says Locke, who seems to have transferred his faith from the hatch itself directly to Desmond. Jack says what Desmond's talking about is insane, and Locke wants to know why he thinks that. "Because the last time I saw the computer that was going to save the world, it didn't look like that," whatever that means. Jack's got a big, fancy G5 at home, I guess. ["Never mind the fact that they're already arguing about 'believing' Desmond, despite the fact that what he said really made no sense, and realistic dialogue would have had them asking some follow-up questions, like about what the button actually does -- no, the train just goes straight to 'scuffle over who's going to push it' with no stops at Credible Writingville." -- Sars] Locke asks if Jack's really upset because Desmond recognized him. "Because that would be impossible," says Locke. Locke thinks it's plausible that the Apple II is preventing the world from ending, but it's impossible that Desmond and Jack have met before. Check.

Now, as in all the great social studies classes of my youth, we watch an outdated film. Locke is rapt. The title screen has the Dharma swan with "The Dharma Initiative" written over it, and "3 of 6" and "Orientation" below. Then, underneath the full Dharma logo on the screen it reads "Orientation -- Station 3 -- The Swan." The film is grainy and full of skips and jumps, and looks a few decades old, but I've done my best to make everything out, since I imagine if I miss something, it will wind up being a crucial detail. We fade up on a handsome Asian man (who is not Daniel Dae Kim) standing in what looks like a research lab.

"Welcome, I'm Dr. Marvin Kandel, and this is the orientation film for Station 3 of the Dharma Initiative. In a moment you'll be given a simple set of instructions for how you and your partner will fulfill the responsibilities associated with the station. But first, a little history."

Desmond's working on the computer while Jack pesters him, asking him if he's in contact with the people who made the film. "Do you think I'd be here if I was?" says Desmond, not even looking up. Jack wants to know how it's possible Desmond doesn't know about the crash, about the survivors. "I push this button every 108 minutes. I don't get out much," is the reply. Yeah, and what's the deal with the replacements? Well, Kelvin died waiting for them. Okay, we get it: Jack's a skeptic. We understand. After a couple more questions designed to point out to Desmond how silly this all is, Jack just finally erupts and asks Desmond if he's ever considered that this whole thing, the hatch and the button, everything, is an experiment. A mind game. That's kind of what I ask myself from time to time watching this show, you know. Desmond finally looks right at him. "Every single day," he says. "And for all our sakes, I hope it's not real. But the film says this is an electromagnetic station. And I don't know about you, brothah, but every time I walk past that concrete wall out there, my fillings hurt." The timer flips to forty-nine minutes.

Desmond puts the cover back on the computer, says "all right," and flicks the switch. The hole is momentarily plunged into darkness, before being bathed in faint yellow backup light. "Oh no," says Desmond. Yeah, that's putting it mildly. Locke comes running in. He has a box of popcorn and a Coke, but apparently the concession stand was out of Twizzlers. "What happened?" he asks, and Desmond says, "It's over!" which, thanks to my love of Rocky, forces me to yell, "Nothing is ovah!" Desmond goes running into the pantry. I hope he's not looking for those chocolate bars, or he's going to be pissed. Desmond starts stuffing a backpack full of supplies. "Are you going?" asks Locke. Desmond doesn't even bother to answer, but, to be fair, it was a pretty stupid question. , Desmond goes for some of that stuff he was shooting into his arm in the first episode (we also spot a book called The Third Policeman, which I've read, and I encourage you to do so, and to do this: read the first word on pages four, eight, fifteen, sixteen, twenty-three, and forty-two. It's worth it, I promise). Locke says Sayid's coming to fix the computer. "Give him my best," says Desmond pleasantly.

Desmond goes running down the hall to the front door, with Locke chasing him. Jack follows a little more slowly, after spotting a photograph of Desmond with a woman in front of a city skyline. It's a city I don't recognize, but I can tell you that, since there's more than one tall building, it's not my hometown. Locke says Desmond can't leave, and asks where he's going to go. "As far as I can run, brothah," he says, and he's gone. Jack comes , completely ignoring Locke freaking out, asking Jack what they should do. "Nothing. We do nothing. It's not real. None of it is real," he says. Jack's leaving too. "This wasn't supposed to happen!" wails Locke. Jack pauses long enough just to say, "What was supposed to happen?" He's just as much a dick about it as you can imagine, but adds, for good measure, "Bye, John. You're on your own." He closes the door behind him.