OFF THE ISLAND

We begin on Penny's boat, shortly after the Oceanic 6 were rescued. Kate asks Jack what they should do about Aaron and comes up with the idea of pretending Aaron is hers. Jack is skeptical but agrees, and asks Kate if she's got his back when convincing the others they have to lie.

Three years later: Sun loans Kate a dress and agrees to watch Aaron while Kate takes care of some business. As Kate leaves, Sun gets a delivery - photos of Ben with Jack.

The package also includes some chocolates ... and a gun.

Kate visits the lawyer and tries to strike a deal where she promises to give a blood sample if she can first speak to the "client." The attorney doesn't buy into it and offers merely "to make the exchange of custody as smooth as possible." Kate is terrified at the prospect of losing Aaron, even more so by the fact that she still doesn't know to whom.

Jack is still treating Sayid but is pulled away by another doctor who tells him that he isn't supposed to treat patients, as he's been suspended.

He also gets a call from Hurley, who says everything is fine because he's in jail. They'll never get to him in there, he says!

A male nurse arrives to give Sayid meds, but Sayid decides immediately that he's bad news. He's right. Narrowly avoiding being shot yet again, Sayid attacks and kills the man, asking who he's working for. The man says the address is in his pocket... and it's Kate's address.

Jack calls to warn her, but she's busy stalking the lawyer, Norton, so he might lead her to his client. Jack decides to go find her while Ben and Sayid head off to get Hurley out of jail somehow.

Jack gets Kate to meet him and she tells him about the lawyer. She sees Norton leave and forces Jack to hop in the car to stalk him with her.

They track the lawyer in their car to a motel where he goes upstairs and opens a door to meet ... Claire’s mother, Carol Littleton.

When Norton leaves, Jack goes talk to Claire’s mom to fix it. Jack meets with Carol, who is busy staring at a photo of her daughter.

Jack explains that they lied to protect everyone, including Aaron, but she has no idea what he’s talking about, or even who Aaron is.

He runs back to Kate and explains that Carol is suing Oceanic Airlines and is in town to collect her settlement, with no clue about Aaron.

Kate doesn’t think it’s a coincidence that her lawyer happens to be the same one asking questions, but Jack is now even more determined to meet back up with Ben at the location he specified earlier.

At that time, Ben and Sayid arrive at the courthouse where Ben’s lawyer tells him there’s no case against Hurley - the guard outside the mental hospital was shot before he escaped - and he should be released.

The lawyer is Dan Norton, one and the same. Looks like Ben hatched this lawsuit against Kate as a plan to get her to go back to the island.

Jack and Kate go to the marina to meet Ben and Sayid. Shocked to see him, Kate accuses Ben of being the man behind the lawyer harassing her.

Jack denies it and says he's on their side now, but Ben casually admits it was him. Kate is still in a state of shock that any of this is happening.

Sun is also at the pier, but watching them all from her car, with Aaron in the back seat. She grabs her gun and opens her car door ...

ON THE ISLAND

Juliet asks Daniel if he knows why Charlotte just had a seizure. He equates it to jet lag (times 10,000 maybe) and is sort of unhelpful when asked why it doesn't happen to everyone, apparently.

Locke tells Sawyer they should take the Zodiac to travel around the Island to the Orchid Station so that he can leave the Island and get Jack and the rest of their friends to come back. He believes he can make these time flashes stop by going to where they started, which was the Orchid.

This is all happening because they left, he's sure. Sawyer is against the idea, so Locke persuades him by promising the return of Kate.

Charlotte wakes up, disoriented but more or less fine. They set off to the Orchid. On the way, they see a pillar of light rising from the ground and Locke suggests a detour, wanting nothing to do with it.

Sawyer hears a scream and goes to investigate, peeking through some trees and seeing Kate and Claire, delivering the latter's baby. They're back in 2004!

[Cue time flash]

Kate's gone, and once again the islanders have no clue when they are. They make it to the beach, where their camp is there, but the Zodiac is not.

There are, however, two large canoes containing some Ajira Airlines bottled water. Their camp is there, but the canoes obviously have not been there yet, so they've gone into some undetermined point in the future now.

They hop in one of the canoes to paddle to the Orchid Station. Soon enough, the other canoe is behind them and the people are shooting at them.

They paddle harder and Juliet fires back at them, but they're gaining ground fast. As Sawyer exclaims "Thank you Lord!" the sky begins to turn white ...

[Cue time flash]

He takes it back. It's dark and torrentially raining. But with no one shooting at them at least. They make it to land and the rain stops.

There, they find wreckage with French writing, and Locke deduces that the stuff is not that weathered, so this wreck must have just happened.

Miles and Juliet are both getting nosebleeds now as well.

Back in the water (it's pouring again, presumably in the same storm a few hours ago), we see a group of French people on a life raft, paddling for their lives and desperate to find shore.

They find a body floating in the water.

The drag it aboard, and it’s none other than Jin. Somehow he must have made it off the freighter and close enough to the island that he is also being subjected to time travel like Locke, Sawyer & Co.

On land, we meet five French men and one young French woman. They try to talk to Jin, and learn that he speaks a little English.

Jin is banged up but alive, managing to communicate his name, that he was on a boat, and that it sank, and that's pretty much it.

The woman introduces herself to Jin. A very pregnant French woman ... named Danielle Rousseau.

Bong.