The petty details of so-and-so's life

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So the hatch is a “communo-research compound,” the Dharma Initiative, the brainchild of B.F. Skinner devotees from the University of Michigan (Wolverines suck!) for studying meteorology, psychology, parapsychology, zoology (polar bears fighting!) and, um, how a man can survive when his only entertainment is Mama Cass records and old Apple II games (“GO W: You cannot go that way. SCREW THIS: I don’t know how to screw”). But like drug deals in action movies, things went wrong. This hatch is Station 3, to study the island’s unique electromagnetic properties. The nice scientician on the orientation film says there was an “incident” but doesn’t say what it was, just explains that when the alarm sounds, the code must be entered into the computer. Locke’s all, cool! Sign me up! But Jack thinks it’s all garbage, and when a stray bullet from Desmond’s gun breaks the computer, Desmond takes off running, leaving the Lostaways to figure out what to do. Sayid and Hurley are brought back to the hatch, Sayid to fix the computer and Hurley hopefully not so they can set up “fat guy eats all the food in the pantry” plotlines or “everyone thinks fat guy ate all the food in the pantry but really he didn’t and everybody learns a valuable lesson” plotlines. Jack and Locke have an annoying fight about faith, with Locke insisting Jack push the button, and Jack refusing, until the last moment, like that proves anything. Michael, Jin and Sawyer are thrown in a pit by a huge guy whose name is probably not Adebisi. Michael tries everything: “Hey!” and “Where’s my boy!” and “Em City represent!” but nothing works. Girlfighter Michelle Rodriguez gets thrown in with them to gain their trust, which they do, since she’s another survivor, but turns out she’s helping the Adebisians. In the flashbacks, Locke follows eight simple rules for boinking Peg Bundy, and stalks his kidney-stealing asshole of a father. It ends badly. But Locke flashbacks generally rule, and these are reliably good, but hey. You guys had me with the combover. Want more? The full recap starts right below!

Just want to point out, off the top, that the shot of "the Others" on the beach is a different one than we supposedly saw "previously" on Lost. I hate when shows do that. This one's less silhouetty, and they're not advancing. Just standing there, all Warriors-like, glaring at Michael, Jin, and Sawyer.

We pick up right there this week, with the lead Other (let's assume, as he's the biggest, the meanest-looking, and he's in front) hopping down from the rock the group is standing on and striding towards our heroes. He's played by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, who played model prisoner Adebisi on Oz, so until I learn his actual name, Otherbisi it is. He's carrying a rather large, round stick, and when Sawyer gets up, Otherbisi gives him a Barry Bonds across the jaw. Former cellmate Michael "Augustus Hill" Dawson gets no love either, with a one-two combination in the gut and the back, and Jin gets clubbed with a rather frightening-looking Otherbisi bringing down an overhand skull-cracker.

Now our heroes are being dragged through the jungle in nets. As far as the theory that the Others (if these are the Others Rousseau warned about) are descendants of the slaves from the Black Rock, there appears to be a blonde woman and at least another white or possibly Asian woman dragging the guys. Michael, Jin, and Sawyer are thrown into brush-covered holes in a clearing in the jungle. Michael groggily says, "Where's my boy," and gets louder at Otherbisi, who's looking down into the pit. "What'd you do with my boy?" yells Michael, although I don't think any of these Others were on the biker gang pirate ship. Otherbisi drops the brush cover back down on the pit and walks away while Michael futilely yells for him to come back.

How many times do we have to see the Desmond/Jack standoff? I've seen this as often as I've seen The Big Lebowski, and no points for guessing which one I enjoy more. "Do you want him to die?" and "Is this what you were talking about, Locke?" and all that. Locke gets the "we're going to flashback with this guy" shot, so this is promising.

There's Locke, with a pretty stellar comb-over. Excellent. This episode gets an A-plus right here. He's in what appears to be an Al-Anon meeting, or maybe just some sort of group therapy session. Some sad young woman is talking about her mother stealing her money again, thirty dollars this time (Locke rudely checks his watch), when she wants a drink, and says, "I know it may not seem like a lot of money to some of you, but it's a lot to me. And I want it back." Locke, covering his face with his hand, can't suppress a chuckle. Apparently the kidney his birth father stole contained his civility as well.

The group's facilitator or counsellor or whatever looks at him coolly. For a brief second I excitedly thought she was played by Frances McDormand with a blonde wig, but alas. She asks if Locke's got something to say. No, he'd prefer to sit there and snicker, thank you. The facilitator presses further, saying Locke has been coming here for a week now, so he finally says that he doesn't think that thirty dollars is worth getting upset about, and when the facilitator starts to say "Francine feels like thirty dollars..." Locke interrupts her with, "Francine feels a little too much, if you ask me. You all do." Yeah, Francine. You sit down. Put on your "well, I never!" face if you must, but sit down. Locke then outlines his endorsement of Denis Leary's "shut the fuck up!" form of therapy, mocking the other participants' various complaints. We see Katey Sagal try to hide a smile. Oh, Katey Sagal. Yeah, that's better than Frances McDormand. Locke trumps the "so-and-so never called me back" with "Hey, I never even KNEW my parents!" and wins the hand outright with "my real father pretended to love me just long enough to steal my kidney!" It gets even more complainy, with Locke saying his father dropped him back out in the world like a piece of trash, "just like he did on the day I was born." Francine is now looking like, "Okay, I guess losing thirty dollars isn't so bad," but Locke is shouting by this point. "You want your damn thirty dollars back? I want my kidney back." He sits back in his chair.

Outside the meeting, Locke struggles in vain to light a cigarette, because when your dad stole your kidney, you can't even use a lighter properly, that's how much your life will suck. He throws the cigarette away in frustration. Katey strolls up to him, and I have to confess that I didn't recognize her, given that her hair was piled on top of her head, and she didn't have one giant eye, and she...um...all right, I've never seen Eight Simple Rules for Pretending Our Show Will Go On After John Ritter Dies, so I can't complete that sentence. It was when she started to speak that I knew who she was. She says tossing the cigarette is a good idea, because if he gets kidney cancer, he's only got the one. "That's funny," he says.

They start to walk, and Locke apologizes for ruining her meeting, and she says he just said what she's always thought anyway, adding that most of the time she wants to stand up and shout, "Get over it, freaks!" and Locke asks why she doesn't, and instead of saying, "Well, I'm not a dick," she says that she likes to keep a cork in it, because once she gets all "hot and bothered" there's no stopping her. Um, is she even talking about the meeting anymore? "Guess you won't be coming back week ," she says regretfully. Locke figures not. "Too bad. I like bald guys," she says. "I'm not bald," Locke says, delusionally. "I can wait," fires back Katey. Nice one. Locke smiles. Katey introduces herself as Helen, and Locke does likewise (except, uh, you know, as "Locke").

Cut back to Desmond still pointing the gun at Locke, down in the hatch-hole. Jack yells again, "Where's Kate?" and then we see Kate crawling along the ducts again, only given that this is our first Mama Cass-free episode this season, I can't believe they didn't hear her clunking along. She finds another air duct, and drops down into a dark room. She finds the door, and slides it open several inches. The light lets her see that she's in Desmond's walk-in armaments closet, so she grabs a shotgun and loads it up. Our fugitive knows how to use one of those, too. She creeps up behind Desmond, then sponks him in the back of the head. Desmond's rifle goes off, firing wide, as he crumples to the floor. Jack scrambles over to the prone Desmond, pointing his gun and telling him not to move. When Locke says, "Jack, don't," pointing out that Desmond is now unarmed, Jack yells, "He just had a gun pointed at your head!" Desmond lifts his head, and sees that his shot appears to have hit the Apple II. "What did you do?" he whispers. Jack looks up, sees the bullet hole in the computer casing. "We're all going to die," says Desmond. Kate and Locke look suitably alarmed. So Desmond says it again. Should have spoiler-tagged that, Desmond.

After commercials, Desmond struggles to get to his feet, saying he has to fix the computer. Jack wants to know what the hell he's talking about. "If you don't let me up, we're going to die," says Desmond. Jack's still being the tough guy, so Desmond points out the timer on the wall, which flips from ninety-eight to ninety-seven minutes as we watch. He says he needs to enter the code, he's gotta push the button. Locke tries telling Jack to let Desmond do it. "Don't tell me what to do," snaps Jack, like a child. He turns Desmond over slightly, points the gun at his face, and asks him what'll happen if he doesn't enter the code. A flicker of recognition crosses Desmond's face. "Do I know you?" he says. Locke looks sharply at Jack, probably remembering Jack's "You!" when he first Desmond's face. Jack flips Desmond back over. Jack looks up at Kate, still holding her shotgun. "You got him?" he says, so he stands up, puts away his gun. With Kate covering Desmond, he frantically starts examining the computer, flipping switches in vain. Locke stares at Jack. "What?" says Jack. "Nothing, Jack," says Locke, mildly.

Flashback to a bedroom with a sleeping Helen, and a Locke getting dressed, quietly so as not to wake her. Or perhaps it's out of reverence. Whatever his reason, he's not quiet enough, and she stirs. "Hey," she says smiling, and then looking puzzled. "What are you doing? Where are you going?" Locke mumbles something about having trouble sleeping in a strange bed. Helen considers this before making a "oh, here we go," face, so Locke hastily assures her that it has nothing to do with her. "I really like you," he says, apologizing and promising to call her. Because the more phony-sounding lines you pile on, the more likely you'll be believed. Helen looks like she's unsure whether to believe him or not, but seems to be erring on the side of not checking off any plus-one boxes any time soon.

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."

Cut to a college campus. "The Dharma Initiative was created in 1970, and it is the brainchild of Gerald and Karen DeGroot -- two doctoral candidates at the University of Michigan." Shot of a blonde hippie professor and a bearded professor not working so hard at their research that they can't wave at the camera. "Following in the footsteps of visionaries such as B.F. Skinner ... imagined a large scale communal research compound where scientists and free thinkers from around the globe [shots of the DeGroots teaching] could pursue research in meteorology [we're flying through clouds], psychology [some blindfolded guy strapped into a rotating apparatus], parapsychology [blindfolded woman pointing at a red ball, the DeGroots looking on approvingly], zoology [polar bears fighting, Walt nowhere nearby], electromagnetism [Gerald DeGroot, wearing goggles, looking at some...uh...gadget], and utopian social ... Danish industrialist and munitions magnate Alvar Hanso, whose financial backing made their dream of a multi-purpose social science research facility a reality." Zoom in from outside a building on a man standing motionless. It's too blurry to get much of a look at him.

Back to Dr. Kandel: "You and your partner are currently located in Station 3, or the Swan, and will be for the 540 days." Jack looking like, "I don't think so." Locke looking like, "Cool!" "Station 3 was originally constructed as a laboratory where scientists could work to understand the unique electromagnetic fluctuations emanating from this sector of the island.

"Not long after the experiments began, however, there was...an incident." That last ellipsis was actually a pause in Kandel speaking, not a cut on the film itself. I love how Kandel pauses there. Some bad shit went down in this "incident," obviously. "And since that time the following protocol has been observed: every 108 minutes the button must be pushed." Kandel wanders over to a little model of the antique technology room. Aw, it looks so cute. He should have put little G.I. Joes in there; that would have ruled. "From the moment the alarm sounds you will have four minutes to enter the code into the microcomputer processor ... induction into the program. When the alarm sounds, either you or your partner must input the code. It is highly recommended that you and your partner take alternating shifts. In this manner you will stay as fresh and alert ... utmost importance that when the alarm sounds the code be entered correctly, and in a timely fashion." Jack starts rolling his eyes, because, you see, he is a Man of Science! "Do not attempt to use the computer for anyth- ... Congratulations; until your replacements arrive, the future of the project is in your hands. On behalf of the DeGroots, Alvar Hanso, and all of us at the Dharma Initiative, thank you. Namasté. And good luck."

Credits roll. Copyright The Hanso Foundation, 1980. All Rights Reserved. Soundtrack available on A&M Records.

Jack's silent, before looking over at Locke, who's still staring at the screen. "We're going to have to watch that again," Locke says.

Flashback to Locke and Helen, at a restaurant. Helen puts a little gift-wrapped box on his plate. Aw, and Locke didn't get you anything except a frustrating relationship with an emotional refugee. "It's been six months. Sort of an anniversary, right?" she says, and fortunately the pedantic Locke doesn't correct her, and he says he didn't get her anything, which she says is okay because her gift only cost a buck, and here's hoping she breaks a five when it's actually an anniversary. He opens it, and it's a key to her place, because, she says, he might be "tired of knocking." Locke looks a combination of touched and not thrilled. "Why, Helen. I don't know what to say," he says, which probably isn't the reaction she was hoping for but she presses on anyway. She tells him the key comes with one condition. See, Locke, this is where it starts. She says that when he stays over, he has to stay over. She tells him that she followed him the other night, and asks him if that was his father's house. Locke's silent for a long while. "Why would you follow me, Helen? Why would you do that?" he says, shaking his head. He talks about how this is his business, and she says she wasted twenty years of her life being angry, and she needed to help to get over it, and blah blah blah. "You helped me, John. And I can help you," she says, and then asks him to promise not to go to his father's house anymore. After a moment's consideration, he agrees, puts the key in his pocket, and then they start making out right there in the restaurant, which I'm sure the other diners appreciate.

Back in the hatch-hole, Locke's getting the film ready for an encore presentation, and Jack sounds surprised that Locke wants to watch it again, even though Locke just said that, and Locke's surprised that Jack doesn't want to, and Jack stomps off.

Back in the pit, Michelle Rodriguez is coming to, and she's startled to see Michael, Jin, and Sawyer all sitting there staring at her. "Who are you?" she says, and Michael says they crashed, that they were on a flight from Sydney to Los Angeles. "What?" she says, surprised. "Forty of us made it." "Flight 815?" she says. Shot of Jin's surprise, as he seems to understand what she says. For now, let's just assume he recognizes the English numbers from his own flight reservation. It seems to take Sawyer and Michael a second or two longer to realize that she was on the flight. "You were in the back?" says Michael, who points out that the back broke off, and he's in the midst of asking her how they survived when she says she doesn't know. How did you survive, Michael? Damn. She says the plane came apart, and "someone's frickin' hardside" came out of an overhead compartment and hit her in the head, knocking her out. She came to underwater, then swam up and to shore. "You've been out here by yourself all this time?" says Sawyer. "Trying to find food," she says. "Making my way" (the only way she knows how? Is that just a little bit more than the law will allow?). "And then, yesterday, they found me," she says. Michael asks who they are. "You tell me," she says. Nah, she's not suspicious at all. Michael asks if she saw a boy with them, and when she says "no," she clearly looks like she's not telling them something. She introduces herself as "Ana-Lucia," and Sawyer introduces our heroes. "We're about to be the best thing that ever happened to you," he says, like, Sawyer can't even resist hitting on the kidnap victim that shares his jungle pit. "How's that?" she asks, and he pulls out his gun and says that the time "Shaft" opens the cage, "he's gonna get a surprising little howdy-doody." Ana-Lucia just looks at him. Typical of Sawyer to figure she's going to be impressed with what he has in his pants.

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 heads back to the computer room, where he starts fiddling with the computer. He knocks some tools onto the floor, and starts gathering them up, growing increasingly agitated, muttering, "Why is this happening?" before finally losing it and yelling, "What am I supposed to do?"

Helen's in bed, asleep. Locke's lying on his back, looking at the ceiling. Then he's washing his face in the bathroom, and rubbing the scar from his kidney operation. Then he's looking at his ear and wondering if he should get it re-pierced. Then he's wondering if thirty is too old to do that, or if thirty is in fact too young for this to be a midlife crisis, so he should definitely do it now before he actually is too old to do it. Or was that me? It's true what they say; the mind is the first thing to...uh...I'll have to get back to you.

So naturally, we wind up back in front of Papa's house. It's dark. Locke's sipping coffee again (all-night place nearby?). Suddenly, headlights flare from behind him and draw closer before hitting his back bumper. Not hard, but hard enough so that it wasn't an accident. Cooper? Nope. Scarier than a heartless kidney-stealing birth father, it's a pissed-off girlfriend. Helen stomps up to the driver's side window and glares at Locke. Then, without saying a word, she reaches in the window and yanks Locke's car keys out of the ignition and strides toward the gate. Locke gets out and chases her, too late to stop her from tossing the keys over the fence. Locke's all, what did you do that for? Yeah, really -- how's he supposed to leave now? Helen turns around and gives him a little bit of tough love, telling him that his father doesn't care. "I know why you're here -- why you keep coming here. You're scared -- scared of moving forward -- with me, with us. You're going to have to choose. Him or me." He tells her it isn't that simple, and she says it is, and he says he can't do it, and she says he can, and so forth. He goes over and kicks the gate in frustration and says he doesn't know how. "Because you don't know what's going to happen," she says. "None of us do. That's why it's called a leap of faith, John. You don't have to be alone." He looks at her, still frightened. She holds out her hand. He seems to surrender and comes back to her, taking her hand, and they stand there a moment. I guess the director cut before Locke said, "So, looks like we're taking your car."

Back in the hatch-hole, Locke is still in Painful Flashback Agony when we hear Kate shouting. She strolls into the antiquated-equipment room, followed by Hurley and Sayid. Look, as I much as I love him, if Hurley's there, they couldn't have really been rushing to get back. Sayid and Hurley look around in bewilderment, with Hurley breaking out his most awestruck "dude." Kate wants to know where Jack is, and Locke just says, simply, "Jack's gone. I need your help." Some follow-up questions might be in order here, Kate, such as, "By 'gone' you don't mean 'dead,' do you?" But if Locke fills them in further, we don't see it.

The timer's at twenty-four minutes. Kate and Hurley are strolling through the facility, looking for, as per Sayid's instructions, the breaker box. He tells them to follow the conduit lines, and Hurley, muttering under his breath, says, "Cool, okay, great. What's a conduit line?" Kate points out the tubes on the ceiling, tells Hurley to follow them. What Hurley, finds, though, is the pantry. He walks in and gives a reverent "whoa." "Did you find it?" calls Kate. Hurley surveys the shelves and shelves of food. "Depends on what you mean by 'it,'" he says. I'm not too worried about stereotypical "fat guy finds the food" plotlines just yet, given that Kate reacted pretty much the same way when she found the food, which is the same way I think anyone would react after spending a month and a half foraging for themselves.

Back in the Other pit, Sawyer's whispering what the plan is going to be: Jin's going to play dead, and Ana-Lucia will call for help. How do they explain that to Jin, by the way? Or is the fact that he looks like he understands perfectly what they're talking about good enough for them? Ana-Lucia scoffs, "Sick prisoner? Are you serious?" Sawyer snaps at her, wondering if she has a better idea. She starts quizzing him about the gun, like where he got it, why he didn't use it when he was captured, that sort of thing. It takes him a little longer than it should to wonder why she's pressing for information, and when Sawyer is distracted by Michael saying they've got to get going, Ana-Lucia grabs the gun from Sawyer Girlfight-style and points it at our heroes. Then she yells upwards, "Back up! Back up! Coming up! Coming up!" and Otherbisi comes back, lifts open the cage, and throws a rope loop down for her. She hops on, and he hauls her up. "What happened? Who are they?" he says, in a thick accent. Too bad Michael, Jin, and Sawyer haven't seen any of her movies, apparently, or they'd know Michelle Rodriguez specializes in scrappy little firecrackers. ["And surfers, which could be an interesting wrinkle." -- Sars]

Desmond's running through the jungle, and at this point I'd even settle for an orchestral version of Creedence's "Run Through the Jungle," but it's not happening, not this day. He stumbles and falls, spilling open his backpack, and as he stuffs it again, Jack strolls up, gun drawn, telling him to stop. Desmond thinks he's there for the code, although Jack doesn't seem to have any idea what he's talking about. Looks like Jack should have paid a little more attention to the orientation film. Desmond starts rattling off the numbers, and he's in the middle of repeating them when Jack orders him to shut up: "Nothing is going to happen. Some man takes you down there, shows you a movie, and you push a button on, on faith alone? Nothing is going to happen!" He yells that last part. Desmond says that in about fifteen minutes, Jack is going to be very right or very wrong, and he calls him "brothah" again. Jack wants to know why he's running. "YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW WHAT YOU'RE RUNNING FROM!" he shouts. Finally Desmond recognizes Jack, making the Adam-West-as-Batman connection-stretch from Jack saying "running" to Jack actually running, in the stadium.

"I remember you," says Desmond, and he recounts their encounter in the stadium, despite Jack warning him to stop. "You're a doctor, right? There was this gull. You were worried. You said, you said you failed her. That was you!" Jack's moved on from "stop" to "it doesn't matter," even when Desmond asks if the "gull" was okay. Desmond presses, asks what happened to her. "I married her!" Jack shouts, and breaks down, turning his back on Desmond, who you'd think would start running again. Instead, he says, "Right. And you're not...you're not married to her anymore, then?" Jack can't even answer; he just sort of shakes his head. Desmond doesn't ask any more questions, just gathers up his stuff and says, "See you in another life, yeah?" which is exactly how he said goodbye to Jack all those years before.

Back in the hatch-hole, the timer flips from six minutes to five minutes. "Can you fix it?" asks Locke, pacing. Sayid's sitting at the computer. "This man, whoever he was, replaced the motherboard," he says, doing some poking around. "The power transformer is blown." Locke asks if Sayid doesn't need to know why. "All I need to know is that the timer is counting down to something, and that this computer needs to be repaired. I'm sure you'll tell me why once I've done so." Wow. Sayid really is the perfect soldier, isn't he? We see Kate find the breaker box, and flip the switch. "Found it!" she yells, in case anyone missed the lights coming back on.

Then the timer flips to four minutes and the beeping starts. Hurley, coming back to the computer room, wants to know what that is, but given that no one knows anything about it beyond its being a countdown clock, no one says anything. Now that the power's back on, Locke tries to do a little armchair computer repair, but Sayid tells him he's on it, putting the cover back on the computer and saying he's reconnected the processor and replaced the transformer. He flicks the switch, and the angry smiley prompt is instantly there, no boot-up or anything. "Okay, so what now?" says Kate, and Locke sits down at the computer, saying there was a code that Desmond made him enter, and he starts entering it, having slight difficulty remembering what it was. "Four, eight..." he starts saying, as he enters the numbers, so naturally Hurley snaps to: "Wait a minute," and as Locke continues with the numbers, Hurley gives him a "Dude, I'm serious, stop!" and Locke calls him "Hugo" and says it's not the time or the place. Hurley's saying, "Yeah, well, I think it is!" when Locke gets to the last number, which he thinks is 32. Hurley pauses, then says, "You know what? Forget it. Do your thing." Locke's finger hovers over the execute button for a moment, enough time for us to hear Jack say, "It's not 32, it's 42."

Jack's standing in the doorway. "He just told me; Desmond. The last number's 42." Locke asks him if he's sure, and Jack says he is. He doesn't look terribly happy about this whole business. Neither does Hurley, but for different reasons. Locke types in 42, then again, hovers over the EXECUTE button. Then he looks at Jack, who's walking out of the room. "You do it, Jack," he says. Jack comes back, all "what?" and Locke starts this ridiculous argument about how Jack saw the film and saw that "this is a two-person job," like, pressing the EXECUTE button is not a two-person job, Locke, and I don't care that you think you need to get Jack on board. There are three other people in the room here with you, including Sayid, who thank god just says, "This argument is irrelevant," and it's nice that he's thinking for himself again. He's about to press the button, but Locke stops him because of this "Jack has to do it" nonsense.

Jack's refusing, saying none of this is real, and Locke can push the button his own goddamn self. But Locke's not buying Jack's trust in science. I know, hard to believe. "If it's not real, then what are you doing here, Jack? Why did you come back? Why do you find it so hard to believe?" Jack wants to know why Locke finds it so easy. "It's never been easy!" shouts Locke. Everyone watches the showdown as the timer's down to 1:04. Kate offers a "Maybe you should just do it," but Jack dismisses even her with a "no, it's a button." Locke says he can't do it alone: "I don't want to. It's a leap of faith, Jack." And this has been discussed endlessly in the TWoP forums, but it's worth pointing out here: you can just as easily tell Locke that it's just as big a leap of faith if not more so not to push the button. ["And that Kate or one of the other two could have just pushed it themselves. This scene is untenably contrived. Shut up, show." -- Sars]

The timer's down to 27 seconds, as Jack considers this. He strolls over to the computer, Sayid making way. He stands there, staring at the EXECUTE button. Shit, Jack, if you're going to do it, do it. The beeping speeds up when the timer hits ten seconds. Jack looks unsure for a moment, then hits the button. The timer's frozen at one second, then resets. Locke watches him, then walks over to the computer. "I'll take the first shift," he says, quietly. Jack kind of shakes his head and walks out of the room, presumably to go call dibs on the top bunk.