Sawyer notices Paulo
with one of his magazines, who explains that "they share things now".
After seeing that the castaways have set up a ping-pong table, Sawyer
decides to challenge someone to a game to retrieve his "stash". Sun
decides that if he loses, he has to give up using colorful nicknames
for a week.
Elsewhere in the jungle, Locke, Sayid, Kate and Rousseau
stumble across a farmhouse with a satellite dish on its roof. Its
inhabitant is revealed to be the mysterious one-eyed man whom Sayid,
Locke and company saw on The Pearl’s monitoring video in the episode "The Cost of Living".
Sayid approaches the house unarmed. Danielle decides not to get
involved. Sayid approaches (noticing a mysterious cat whose name is
later revealed to be Nadia), but as he nears, the one-eyed man appears
and shoots Sayid in the shoulder, screaming that he didn't cross the
line, and that they had a truce. After Sayid tells him about the plane
crash, the one-eyed man emerges. Kate and Locke rush out from hiding to
disarm him. The one-eyed man reveals his name to be Mikhail Bakunin, and claims he is the last living member of the DHARMA Initiative.
While treating Sayid's gunshot wound, Mikhail tells the survivors
about how he came to the island, after responding to a newspaper
advertisement for the DHARMA Initiative. He has been on the island for
eleven years, staying in the station called The Flame, where he
communicates with the outside world. Mikhail tells Sayid that several
years ago, the DHARMA Initiative launched a purge against "the
hostiles," but Mikhail did not participate in it. As a result, the
hostiles let him live, provided he did not cross the line around his
house. He also states that the dish on the roof has not worked for
years, and that the hostiles were on the island long before the DHARMA
Initiative. Meanwhile, Locke finds a monitored computer which asks him
to play chess. He does, and begins a losing streak. Sayid realizes
Mikhail is an Other, not a member of the DHARMA Initiative, and almost
certainly is not alone.
The ping-pong match begins between Hurley and Sawyer. Sawyer loses, but
Hurley takes pity on him and returns some of his magazines. At this
point, Hurley reassures Sawyer that Kate will be safe while with Sayid
and Locke.
Mikhail explains that The Flame is connected to an underwater beacon to
guide submarines to the island. When Sayid taunts Mikhail about killing
one of the hostiles, Mikhail attacks him and Kate, but is overpowered.
They tie him up. Sayid reveals a hatch hidden under a rug. Kate and
Sayid descend into the hatch while Locke keeps watch over the
unconscious Mikhail. The basement is wired with explosives. Sayid finds
several DHARMA manuals. Upstairs, Locke is distracted by the prompting
of the chess game. He finally manages to beat the chess game, after
which the screen changes to a video of "Dr. Marvin Candle" / "Dr. Mark Wickmund",
which tells him to enter number codes for communication. Since, the
satellite and sonar have been rendered inoperable, Dr. Candle says,
"Has there been an incursion of the station by the hostiles? If so,
enter 7-7." Locke is about to enter the code when Mikhail appears
behind him and holds a knife before his throat. In the basement, Kate
is attacked by Ms. Klugh, but Sayid comes to her defense. Kate
retaliates, punching Ms. Klugh in the face after recognizing her as one
of the Others from the Pala Ferry dock when they were kidnapped, and
tells Sayid that she will know where Jack is. They take her upstairs.
Locke is outside, being held at gunpoint by Mikhail. There is a lot of
arguing in Russian between Klugh and Mikhail[1],
and then Mikhail shoots Klugh. Locke struggles for the gun, and Sayid
manages to knock Mikhail to the ground. Mikhail begs to be killed, but
Sayid lets him live.
Locke watches Dr. Candle’s video again, pausing at the “Enter 7-7"
part. Sayid shows Mikhail a map that shows a cable running from The
Flame to a place called “The Barracks.� Mikhail doesn’t tell him about
this place on the map, but warns that the moment Sayid’s guard is down,
he will attack. Danielle agrees with this. “You have a map,� she says,
“why keep him alive?� Sayid will not kill him. Locke emerges and says
that he beat the chess game and found out why Mikhail hadn’t wanted him
to beat it. The farmhouse blows up. Once again, one of Sayid’s hopes of
being able to communicate with the outside world has been taken away by
Locke. As the group turns to leave, Sayid’s flashlight catches sight of
the gray cat.
In his flashback, Sayid is a chef in a restaurant in Paris, France.
He is summoned onto the portico by a man named Sami (an Iraqi), who
compliments the meal Sayid cooked for him, and offers him a job as a
chef in his new restaurant. Sayid later arrives at the restaurant, and
meets Sami's wife. She has strange scars on her arm, but their
introduction is cut short when the woman confirms that Sayid is “him.�
Sayid is suddenly attacked and knocked unconscious. He is chained up in
the basement of the restaurant. Sami explains that his wife was
tortured by the Republican Guard, and she recognized her torturer to be
Sayid. Sayid denies this passionately. Sami’s wife is brought before
Sayid as Sami begins to brutally beat him, trying to get him to admit
that he tortured his wife. Sami reaches for an iron bar, but his wife
stops him. The following day, Sayid is visited by Sami’s wife. She
explains that she rescued a cat from torture by street kids (which
bears a striking resemblance to the cat at the Flame station), and
while it sleeps with her and loves her, it also sometimes attacks her,
because it sometimes forgets that it is safe. She forgives him for
this, because she also knows what it is like to never be safe, because
of Sayid. Sayid admits that he remembers her, that her face has haunted
him since he left Iraq. He breaks down in tears and emotionally
apologizes, over and over. Sami’s wife forgives him. Moreover, she will
tell Sami that she has made a terrible mistake, that they have found
the wrong person, so that Sami will let him go.
