Season 1, Episode 25: Exodus Part 3

The season finale concludes with The Others still presumably coming, a small group returning from the Dark Territory with dynamite, Rousseau on the lam after swiping Aaron from Claire (with Sayid and Charlie in hot pursuit) and the foursome still blissfully at sea aboard the raft awaiting rescue.

MAJOR PLOT POINTS

Run. Hide. Die. Those are the options the survivors have if they want to continue surviving when The Others attack, Rousseau warns. The decision is to hide, which prompted the trek for explosives that will be used to open the hatch, if the group can get back safely. But that seems unlikely when Locke, Hurley, Kate and Jack encounter the Smoke Monster. Rather than run from it, though, Locke seeks it out only to have it catch him and try to drag him underground. Jack and Kate save Locke, who wishes Jack would have let it take him. He doesn't think the Smoke Monster would hurt him.

Discussing the incident, Locke talks about himself as a man of faith and Jack as a man of science. He believes the island brought all of them there for a purpose, but Jack claims not to believe in destiny. "Yes, you do," Locke replies. "You just don't know it yet." Boarding the plane in Sydney, Locke had to be carried, which may or may not have significance. Perhaps it illustrates that each person was destined to make that flight, Oceanic 815.

Out at sea, the radar Sayid rigged for the raft picks up a signal a few hours after nightfall. Michael reluctantly shoots the flare to draw its attention. But the boat turns out to be several of The Others in costume aboard a speed boat.

Meanwhile, when Sayid and Charlie reach the smoke, no Others are nowhere to be found, but Aaron is safe albeit with a now distraught Rousseau, who swears she heard The Others whisper that they were coming for the boy. She gives Aaron back to Sayid. And as it turns out, The Others were coming for the boy — only for a different boy, for Walt, who is snatched from his father in a kidnapping that also gets Sawyer shot and the raft blown to smithereens.

Finally back from the Black Rock, Locke and Jack rig the hatch to blow only to have a hysterical Hurley try to stop them when he realizes "the numbers" are stamped on the outside of the hatch: 4-8-15-16-23-42. The season ends with Jack and Locke staring in the dark abyss of the now-opened hatch.

No much happened flashback-wise, Hurley almost missed Oceanic 815 when the power blew in his room, but through extreme hustle — including a blitz past a girls soccer team also wearing "the numbers" in sequence, 4-8-15-16-23-42 — he miraculously makes the flight, arriving at Gate 23 and talking the gate attendant into letting him board minutes before takeoff. Not, as it turns out, a good thing.

QUOTABLE

"If we survive this, if we survive tonight, we're going to have a Locke problem and I need to know you've got my back." — Jack to Kate, already trying to forge an alliance against Locke