EVERY MAN FOR HIMSELF

Or, One Con Is As Good As Another

[Originally Aired October 25, 2006]

Juliet brings Jack some lunch and the two discuss who runs things at the Hydra. Jack seems to think Ben is in charge, a suggestion Juliet dismisses. She claims they make decisions as a group. At that very moment, Ben busts in and tells her to come with him. Now. She's annoyed, because now she looks like a douche in front of Jack. Colleen has been brought back to the Hydra, she's bleeding and unconscious. At the cages, Danny is about to let Kate and Sawyer out, but is interrupted with news about his wife. Everyone scurries off in a panic. Sawyer smiles, and Kate asks why he is happy. This is their chance to make a break for it, he says. Flashback and Sawyer is boxing. In a prison rec room. After his match he heads back to his cell and witnesses another prisoner being beaten on. Quickly guards and the warden intervene on the man's behalf. Turns out the man is in prison for stealing $10M, but the money was never recovered. Later, in the prison workshop, Sawyer befriends the man, Munson, and warns him the warden is trying to get the money, and will pit his wife against him to do it. The warden is a douche to Sawyer, but Sawyer just takes it. At the Hydra, Sawyer comes up with a plan. He will flood his cell, and when one of the Others opens the cage, he'll grab them and trigger the cage puzzle giving them both a shock. It's an okay plan, excepting how Ben watches everything they do and say through the cameras, so when he approaches the cage later Sawyer's plan fails. Ben instead beats the shit out of Sawyer, knocking him unconscious. I guess Sawyer's role this year is punching bag. On the beach Desmond tells Claire she needs to move from her tent for the evening so he can fix her roof. She thinks he's bonkers and insists the roof is just peachy, or whatever the Aussie version of "peachy" is. Back at the prison, Munson visits with his wife and the two bicker. Sawyer has a visitor too. It's Cassidy, the women he conned out of $600K. She tells him he's the father of her baby, but he gets pissed and walks away saying he has no daughter. That's kind of douchey, but then again, what good is a con man for a father? At the Hydra, Sawyer wakes up strapped to a table. They shove a stick in his mouth and tell him to bite. Why? he asks. "For the pain." Then someone goes all Pulp Fiction on him and jabs him in the heart with a giant needle. Jebus, Sawyer has some shitty-ass karma, doesn't he? Sawyer wakes again and he's bandages on his chest and Ben comes in with a rabbit in a cage and holds it over Sawyer's face. I have a 1984 flashback. The rabbit has an eight painted on his ass. Ben shakes the cages until the bunny drops dead. Someone places a pulse monitor on Sawyer's arm. What the fuck? asks Sawyer. Ben explains how they've put a pacemaker in him, just like the bunny had, and if his pulse goes over 140, his heart will explode. Jebus, Sawyer has some shitty-ass karma, doesn't he? Ben tells him not to tell Kate what they did or that they're monitoring them or anything or they'll put one in her too. They dump Sawyer back in his cage and Kate asks what they did and says nothing happened. She doesn't believe him. On the beach, Desmond borrows a five iron from Paulo, who is kind of a douche. Welcome aboard, newbie, looks like you'll fit right in! At the Hydra, Juliet visits Jack, and she's covered in blood and asks if he will help save Colleen. At the cages, an alarm starts blaring. Kate and Sawyer see Jack being escorted past, a hood over his head. They yell for him, but the alarm drowns them out. Jack enters the Hydra's hospital and begins looking at the x-rays. "Those aren't hers," Juliet tells him. She directs him toward the operating room, and Ben gets mad. Juliet and Ben argue and finally agree to let Jack operate. It does no good. Colleen's heart stops. Jack asks for the defibrillator. It's broken, Juliet informs him. Jack tries CPR. No luck. Jack pronounces her dead at ... there's no clock. Danny goes nuts, and runs out of the room. He drags Sawyer from his cage and pounds the shit out of him. Jebus, Sawyer has some shitty-ass karma, doesn't he? As he beats Sawyer, Danny asks if Kate loves him. He punches Sawyer until she admits she loves him. Back at the prison, Munson has asked Sawyer to help him move the money to a safe location. Later, Sawyer meets with the warden and the feds and tells them where Munson hid the money. In return he is freed and he receives a commission on the money. Sawyer tells the feds to put the money in an account under his daughter's name, and to be sure she never finds out where the money came from. Back at the cages Kate realizes she can probably squeeze out of the top of the cage: the bars are wider there. She climbs out and tries to figure a way to get Sawyer out of his cage. He tells her to leave him, saying "If you really love me, go." She replies "I only said that so he'd stop hitting you." Ouch. She climbs back in her cage. Near Claire's tent Dez starts building ... something. It's a tall, thin structure. The five iron caps it, and Dez runs wire from the golf club to the sand below. Hurley asks if it's supposed to be art, because it's nine million times better than anything Jeff Koons ever made. Hurley is about to wander off but Dez tells him to wait a second. A moment later it starts to rain. Then lightning strikes, hitting the five iron. Hurley eyes Dez again, suspecting, perhaps, Dez does have a new superpower. Jack is handcuffed to the operating table. Juliet apologizes for bringing him here. He asks about the x-rays. She refuses to tell him. Then Jack says whoever they are, they have a tumor on their spine and will be dead soon. "Who am I here to save?" he asks. Ben pulls Sawyer from his cage and they take a long walk across the island. As they climb a hill, Sawyer's heart rate rises and he says this seems like a lot of trouble to kill him. Ben reaches into his messenger bag (fuckin' hipster) and pulls out white rabbit number eight. Ben tells him they merely gave the rabbit a sedative. And all they gave to Sawyer was doubt. Sawyer punches Ben in the mouth. Ben leads Sawyer to the top of the hill. In the distance is another island. What the hell? Ben explains, that is Sawyer's island over there. There's nowhere to escape to. Sawyer is pissed, and Ben explains it's hard to con a con artist. Fortunately Ben is a better con man.