A LONG, LONG TIME AGO

A guy in a white shirt - Jacob!-  makes rope and fishes, while a guy in a black shirt whose name is not mentioned walks up to the beach with Jacob.

They watch a clipper ship - The Black Rock? - approaching in the distance. Jacob has brought the ship there, despite the other guy's warning that it always ends the same way, "They come, they fight, they destroy, they corrupt."

But what the guy really resents Jacob for apparently goes way deeper, since he tells him how much he wants to kill him, while Jacob reminds him that he has to find a loophole to make that happen.

Oh, and the four-toed statue is revealed, and it has a monster alligator head.

UNDETERMINED, VARIOUS POINTS IN THE MORE RECENT PAST

Jacob, who does not seem to age, a la Richard, visits many of the Oceanic 815 passengers before they get on the plane. He helps little girl Kate beat a shoplifting rap, lends little boy Sawyer the pen to write his "Dear Mr. Sawyer" note after his parents' funeral, revives Locke with a single touch after his dad pushed him out the window, gives Sun and Jin marriage advice at their wedding reception, hands Jack a candy bar after that "count to five" surgery disaster he told Kate about in the first episode, seemingly causes Nadia to get hit by a car and killed in front of Sayid's eyes, and most crucially, convinces Hurley to get on the Ajira Flight and hands him the guitar case (what's in it remains a mystery). Oh, and he also pays a visit to Ajira castaway Ilana, and asks for her help.

1977

Kate convinces Sawyer and Juliet to get off the sub by hijacking it, and the three of them paddle away on a raft and hit the beach only to be greeted by... Vincent. His caretakers, of course, are Rose and Bernard, who have been living happily in a jungle shack by themselves.

They say they really don't care if they die, so long as they're together, and Juliet seems to have a little flash that she and her beloved Sawyer might not feel the same way.

They trek on without the lovebirds, and eventually are conveniently standing the path of the Dharma van, driven by Hurley.

That van got there after Sayid used the instructions in Daniel's diary to extract the plutonium warhead from the two-ton bomb, and they put it in a backpack as they head up to the surface in Dharmaville.

In the temple, Richard cold-cocked Eloise and told them they were on their own, then vanished. Jack and Sayid work their way through a panicked Dharmaville by posing in jumpsuits, but it's only a matter of time before that jerk Phil calls them out and a gun battle results.

Sayid gets shot. But soon Hurley, Miles and Jin zoom in with the Dharma van and they drive away toward the Swan. They're gunning toward the Swan and trying to stop Sayid's bleeding when they run into the Juliet, Kate and Sawyer.

2007

Lapidus is still knocked out cold and laid out on the outrigger that Ilana, Bram and their weird crew have stolen, along with the giant freight crate.

They show Lapidus what's in it, and apparnetly that freaks him out enough that he follows them to Jacob's cabin, where Ilana steps over that ash circle and goes inside to find - nothing. The place is abandoned.

Jacob left a note explaining his new home - a tapestry of the scary monster head statue. Ilana explains to her crew how someone else has been using the place, and they trek off to the four-toed statue.

Locke, Ben, Richard and the Others, meanwhile, are trekking away.

Locke bounces back and forth between Richard and Ben. Richard explains that Jacob made him ageless and guesses that Jacob revived Locke too, and taunting Ben about the fact that he never actually met Jacob.

Locke also suggests they're going to have to "deal with" the other Ajira passengers. Ben explains that he lied to Locke about meeting Jacob, as he was embarrassed, and was as surprised as anyone when stuff started flying around in the cabin.

Finally they all arrive at what Richard says is Jacob's home, and it's the four-toed statue. Richard tries to explain to Locke that only he can go in to see Jacob, since he's the only leader and all.

Locke tells Richard to go pound sand, and brings Ben with him anyway. Locke, after all, has already convinced Ben that he must kill Jacob himself.

1977

To try to talk Jack out of setting off the nuclear bomb, Sawyer tells him how he could have kept his parents from getting killes by hopping off the island in the sub, but he didn't, because he knows whatever happened, happened.

Jack admits to Sawyer that this quest is all about Kate, and he figures he can set off the bomb, send them all back to Flight 815, and get together with her through fate.

Sawyer punches Jack repeatedly to try and stop him, only to be interrupted by Juliet, who has changed her mind again and decided Jack SHOULD set off the bomb.

She too is motivated by love, as she doesn't want to lose Sawyer again, figuring he's about to run off with Kate.

Kate tells Jack that she came back to the island to help save Claire.

Miles raises an interesting point, suggesting that Jack may just CAUSE the Incident, not prevent it, by detonating the bomb, and leave them all back where they started.

Naturally, no one listens, and Jack treks off with the bomb to set Faraday's plan in motion once and for all.

2007

Ilana, Lapidus and company show up with the crate and pull out what's in it ... which is Locke's corpse. Sun asks if that's Locke, then who ...

Inside the foot of the status, Ben is looking completely terrified and Locke hands him a knife, promising things will be different once he's gone.

They come inside and there Jacob sits, careful as can be, greeting Locke like an old friend. Because, apparently Locke is that angry guy from the beach. Somehow.

"You found your loophole," Jacob tells him.

Locke nudges Ben toward the man who has rewarded his 35 years of hard work on behalf of the island with nothing. Ben tells him as much, asking why Locke gets whatever he wants and Ben gets nothing.

He says, plaintively, "What about me?"

Jacob responds, "What about you?"

That does it for Ben, who stabs Jacob in the chest. Jacob gasps "They're coming" before Locke kicks him into a fire pit.

1977

As Jack heads toward the Swan, Radzinski yells at Dr. Chang about drilling down into the electromagnetic pocket. Dr. Chang wants him to stop, but the guy will not listen. Drill on, he says.

Phil, meanwhile, is en route to the Swan with people and guns to stop the insurgency. This is about to get all sorts of ugly.

Realizing Jack is in danger, Juliet, Kate and company take the Dharma bus to drive to the Swan area and help him. Another gun battle ensues, and Sawyer eventually gets Phil in a choke hold as a hostage.

Jack drops the bomb.

Everyone freaks out waiting for the explosion, but nothing happens ... until all the metal tools sucked into the hole. A metal platform falls on Pierre Chang's hand, prompting Miles to shout "Dad!" and help him.

Some chains wrap themselves around Juliet, pulling her down into the pit and, despite Sawyer and Kate's efforts to help her, sucking her down for good.

Juliet doesn't die on impact, though. She lands at the bottom, sees the bomb there, unexploded, and hits it with a rock until it explodes.

Fade to white.

Bong.