Lost: Live together, die alone 2

Lost. 2.24. Charlie takes Eko to the dynamite, then thinks twice about it and warns Locke that Eko’s going to blow the blast doors. Desmond’s not worried. He’s sure the doors will hold, like he’s been through this before. Back up to Desmond’s flashback where Kelvin is working on the ultraviolet map beneath a brown stain (aka Radzinsky) on the ceiling. The magnetic field is definitely not a joke. At some point in their hatch time together, Desmond finds Kelvin drunk in the lower catacombs, muttering over a failsafe system complete with key. The Incident was a leak of electromagnetic electricity/energy which now builds up until the button is pushed to discharge it. Whereupon it begins building up all over again. Or something like that.

One day, as Kelvin is preparing for an excursion topside, Desmond sees a tear in his yellow suit and doubts the suit’s necessity. He follows Kelvin outside and watches him take off his mask and suit, then go to where he’s hidden the Elizabeth boat. Desmond confronts him about fixing it and/or leaving with it. In an ensuing struggle, Kelvin’s head is hit against a rock and Desmond gives him up for dead. Is he? Who knows. Desmond rushes back to the hatch which is electromagnetically freaking out under a system failure. Lookout for the flying silverware. Back in their current time, Locke shows Desmond the printouts from the Pearl. Desmond finds the system failure happened on September 22 and utters something he probably feared, “I think I crashed your plane.”

Sayid finds the Others camp abandoned and their hatch doors nothing but doors. The Dumpling Gang wanders onto a pile of canisters full of notebooks. Jack sees Sayid’s smoke signal, but it’s too far away, and realizes Michael has deliberately led them off path. Cue the spooky whispers. And tranquilizing darts. The Gang’s taken to an Others pier where Kate mumbles that she knows Zeke/Tom’s beard is fake and he gives up the hillbilly charade. The Deliverance boat pulls up and Fake Henry steps off. He seems to be in charge of these Others, insisting they’re the “good guys.” Walt (whose speciallness was apparently more than the Others bargained for) is in the boat. Fake Henry gives Michael a compass bearing to follow, assuring him they’ll be rescued. And Michael goes. Well, good riddance. This time Walt cares nothing about his dog’s fate. Buh bye. Fake Henry sends Hurley back with orders to tell the Lostaways to stay away. Kate, Sawyer and Jack? If there’s a plan, we’ll learn about it next season.

While all this is happening, Locke completely loses his faith. Desmond can’t convince him the experiment may really have been the men in the Pearl, not the Swan. Quoting “Strawberry Fields Forever,” Locke says “nothing is real” and smashes the computer monitor. The countdown reaches zero and the magnetic field can’t hold. Desmond decides it’s time to use the failsafe key. Locke admits he was wrong. But about what? Wrong to think he was wrong? Wrong to give up faith? I’m not sure we’ll see him or Eko again to find out. Charlie, though, miraculously survives the fireball and the washer/dryer Dalek-like attack and nonchalantly turns up on the beach to snuggle with Claire. In what appeared to be a commercial, two Portuguese guys’ chess game is interrupted by a signal bleeping. They give Desmond’s gal Penny a call to tell her they’ve found him or it. Best line: Charlie’s “I’ll see myself out.” Next: a summer of speculation galore!