LOST- Episode 53: The Cost of Living

  Previously on LOST: Sun killed Colleen, Jack saw some X-rays, and Eko found his dead brother on the downed prop plane.

  We begin in flashback land as young Eko breaks the lock off of a storage shed so that young Yemi can have some food.  Unfortunately, before they can dig in too much, a stern looking nun busts them and takes them into the church.  She orders young Eko to confess his sin, but he is reluctant.  Is acting on the survival instinct really a sin?  According to this nun's God, it is. 

  In the present, Eko is still unconscious.  Sayid, who is suddenly back, tries to wake him to no avail.  Hurley tells him to let Locke know that he is back.  They leave Eko alone with his mind, which is racing through his first flashback episode.  When he gets to the end, he wakes up to see Yemi by his side.  "It is time to be judged," Yemi tells his older brother.  

  Outside, Sayid, Charlie and Hurley see that the tent they just left is now on fire.  They put it out with dirt and drag Mr. Eko to safety.  Eko grabs Charlie's leg and mutters "My brother," a few times.  Locke comes to check on the fire and when Charlie tries to show him where they left Eko, Eko is no longer there.  This sudden disappearance cues the creepy LOST title screen.

  In his cell, Jack is keeping in shape by doing pull-ups on the pipe, when Ben enters the room dressed in a dressy tunic.  He asks Jack to come for a walk with him and gives him his own tunic to wear.  As Ben leaves to wait outside, Jack asks him if his neck hurts from the tumor.  Ben says he doesn't know what Jack is talking about, but his eyes tell a different story. 

  Jack is led, unrestrained, to the beach where the Others are having a Viking funeral for Colleen.  Juliet approaches him and says she hates funerals- something she has in common with Jack if you can remember all the way back to the first half of the first season.  As the funeral progresses, Ben pulls Juliet aside and asks her why she showed Jack his X-rays. 

  The next day at their own beach, Locke tells Sayid and Desmond that he thinks he knows a way to find their captured friends.  Desmond tells Sayid about the communication capabilitiesof the computer in the Swan station, so Locke thinks they should head back to the Pearl to try its computer out.  Hurley and Charlie report back with the news that they can't find Eko's trail.  When Locke hears that Eko was mumbling about his brother, Locke tells them that they will catch up to him because they are going to the same place. 

  Mr. Eko, meanwhile is stumbling through the jungle in a daze.  As he collapses to the ground, he flashes back to his return to Yemi's church, still being mistaken for a priest.  Since he fooled the military men, he figures he might as well keep this thing going by fooling the whole town.  Never mind that they've, you know, seen him before in his other confrontations with Yemi.  He enters the church and finds his brother's bible bookmarked with a photo of the two brothers from their younger days.  He is disturbed by a woman and her son.  He tells them that he is replacing Yemi, who was called away and she asks if Father Yemi is still going to London. 

  In the present, Eko wakes up suddenly and begins stumbling around again.  He doesn't notice a little piece of Smoky the Monster zip past behind him.  Before he can make it very far, Eko is attacked by some mean looking dudes, who almost nail him in the head with a machete.  He pulls the machete out of the tree it got wedged in and goes on the offensive.  Except that it looks like the damage has been done already, as his attackers are bloody and missing limbs.  One begs for mercy as Eko holds the machete over his head.  Then the begging guy turns into the altar boy Eko just met in his most recent flashback.  The boy tells Eko to Shh and then disappears.  Mr. Eko is very confused.

  Elsewhere, Locke changes things up by telling everyone exactly what is going on, what he plans to do and inviting everyone to come along.  Hurley thinks this a nice change of pace from Jack's leadership by secret mission approach.  Locke's style leads to the recruitment of Nikki, which leads to Paolo reluctantly coming too.  She tells him that he is always complaining about not being included and this is their chance.  Desmond pulls Locke aside and asks him if they are really going for the computer or if they are going after Eko.  Locke tells him that Yemi's plane crashed on the hatch they are going to.  Desmond is impressed by this coincidence, so Locke tells him not to mistake coincidence for fate.

  Meanwhile, Eko makes it to a stream and begins drinking.  He flashes back to the church.  The altar boy tells him not to wash his hands in the holy water, but Eko tells him he is washing away his sins.  They hear gunfire outside, so Eko strolls outside to see what is happening.  It seems Yemi had made some kind of deal with the local thugs for "protection" in exchange for vaccines from the Red Cross, which the bad guys would sell.  I say "it seems" because I'm not entirely sure that's right, but my limit of watching the same scene consecutively is three.  :)  The leader of the bad guys wants to know if Eko will continue to honor Yemi's arrangement, but Eko says he is not afraid of them.  So the bad guy shoots a woman dead and tells Eko to comply by Friday or he will have more blood on his hands. 

  In the present, Eko continues drinking and tending to his polar bear wounds, when he sees Smoky's reflection in the water.  He turns around to face it and Smoky retreats into the jungle with its Smoky tail between its Smoky legs.  Then Locke and company show up to say hello.

  Elsewhere, Juliet enters Jack's cell with a covered plate of mystery lunch.  Jack says he's not big on mysteries.  Juliet lifts the lid to show Jack his cheeseburger, which thoroughly impresses the good doctor.  Ben interrupts their flirty banter to tell Juliet that he needs to speak to Jack alone.  Jack says he is fine with Juliet there, but Ben says it's a matter of doctor-patient confidentiality.  When Juliet leaves, Ben starts going on about the wonderful plan they had to break Jack and convince him that they weren't his enemies.  He says that Juliet resembles Jack's ex-wife and she was the means to get Jack "invested".  Of course, the whole plan was shot to sunshine when Jack saw the X-rays and figured out Ben was dying.  Ben is reduced to simply asking Jack to think about performing the operation.  He says that two days after he was diagnosed with a tumor on his spine, a spinal surgeon fell from the sky.  Proof of God is what that is in Ben's mind.

  Meanwhile, Eko has joined Locke's expedition so Locke begins to talk to him, asking him if he is looking for Yemi.  Eko pushes him against a tree and holds the machete to his throat, demanding that he never say that name.  Locke asks him what he is so afraid of, which triggers a flashback.  Father Eko questions the altar boy's mom about the vaccine arrangement with the militia.  She says the vaccines fetch a high price on the black market but if he is thinking about crossing those men, he had better not.  They owe what little they get to Father Yemi's efforts.  Later, Eko puts his drug dealer hat back on and tries to make his own vaccine deal with someone else.  Then he is going to leave the country.

  Our gang reaches the Pearl hatch and Locke tells Sayid to take everyone down while he helps Eko.  Paolo and Nikki, Mr. and Mrs. Exposition, remind the viewers that Yemi's body is on the plane by talking about what Eko is doing.  As they remove the rocks blocking the door of the plane, Locke wants to talk monster with Eko, asking him what he saw.  Locke says he saw a beautiful light, but that is not what Eko saw.  No, sir.  When they get the final rock moved, Eko is shocked and dismayed to find that his brother's body is gone.

  Locke takes a commercial break to think about it and decides that Yemi's body burned in the fire or was dragged away by animals.  As a resident of Crazy Island, he should know better than that.  Eko pulls the photo of him and his brother from his pocket and tells Locke that he will wait there and not enter the hatch.  Then Locke returns the cross he found while looking for Eko.  Eko flashes back to Yemi's church one more time.  The bad guys kick the door in and ask Eko if he thought they wouldn't find out about the double cross.  Because he is a priest, they will not kill him, but simply chop his hands off.  Eko doesn't like that deal, so he fights back, gets control of the machete and starts hacking away.  This is the exact scene Eko recently recreated on the island, only this time he brings the machete down on his begging enemy instead of having the guy morph into an altar boy.  After his victory, Eko stumbles out of the church with the bloody machete still in his hand.  The town is shocked and disappointed to see this, particularly altar boy and his mom. 

  In the Pearl Station, Nikki watches the Station Five orientation film while Sayid inspects the computer.  He tells Locke that the wiring is one way and it is a dead end.  Nikki asks what the other TVs are for, pointing out that the Dharma dude mentions more than one project on the island.  Sayid goes back to work, trying to patch into any other feeds that might be available.  Paolo emerges from another room to report that the toilet works.  After some fiddling, Sayid manages to get a picture on one of the monitors.  They see a computer room and to their surprise, a dude with an eye patch appears right in front of them.  Then he reaches for the camera and the picture goes dead.  "I guess he'll be expecting us," Locke says.

  Back in Jack's cell, Juliet enters the room on the other side of the glass and pops a movie into the VCR.  Jack says pass, but Juliet insists he watch it, even if the sound is turned down.  She begins to apologize, but as she speaks, Jack notices that the movie playing is not To Kill A Mockingbird, but a home video of Juliet herself holding up large flashcards like that old Bob Dylan video.  The first one says, "Ignore everything I'm saying."

As she goes on and on about how desperate they are to save Ben and how great he is, her signs tell a different story.

"Ben is a liar."

"And he is very dangerous."

"Some of us want a change."

"But it has to look like an accident."

"It has to look like we tried to save him."

"And that's up to you.  Jack"

"It's a complicated surgery.  No one would ever Know"

"And I would protect you"

"Now tell me to turn off the movie"

  Jack does as the video instructs and Juliet leaves him with this new wrinkle to think about.

  In flashback land, Eko has packed up and tells altar boy that he is going to London.  AB asks Eko if he is a bad man and Eko replies that only God knows.  Outside, the altar boy's mother is not grateful that Eko killed the bad men because they will just be replaced.  Eko sees the townspeople boarding up the church and AB's mom informs him that it can no longer be used because of what Eko did in there.  She tells him that he owes Yemi one church.

  In the present, Yemi appears before Eko, but doesn't answer his brother's cries as he stalks off into the jungle.  After a few more moments of shouting and frantic searching, Eko finds his brother waiting for him in a field.  Eko says he is ready and begins his confession.  "I ask for no forgiveness, Father, for I have not sinned.  I have only done what I needed to do to survive.  A small boy once asked me if I was a bad man.  If I could answer him now, I would tell him that when I was a young boy, I killed a man to save my brother's life.  I am not sorry for this.  I am proud of this."  Eko drops to his knees with his arms extended.  "I did not ask for this life I have been given but it was given nonetheless and with it, I did my best."  With spite in his eyes, Yemi tells Eko that he speaks to him as if he were his brother.  Eko stands, confused now.  "Yemi" disappears into the jungle and Smoky the Monster emerges to take his place.  Eko is ready to fight and is not afraid, but you can't win a fight with Smoky when he's in a fighting mood.  Smoky grabs Eko by the waist and whips him violently into nearby tree trunks over and over again.  Locke and company hear the violence above and come rushing to help, but it is too late.  All they find when they get up there is Eko lying bloody and beaten on the ground.  Eko whispers something in Locke's ear, goes to his happy place, which is hanging out with his younger brother in their youth, and then dies.  Sayid asks what was said and Locke solemnly answers.  "We're next."

  Next time on the "Fall Finale" of LOST:  Jack wants to get off the island and Kate and Sawyer get it on.