The episode begins with a flashback of Claire being in a car accident. She comes around, but her mother has been thrown through the car windshield and is lying on the street. The mother ends up on life support, and Dr. Woodruff says the cost of her treatment is being taken care of by someone who wishes to remain anonymous. Later, we see Christian Shepard visiting her. Claire’s aunt Lindsey knows him. He is the one paying the bills, and is her father.
Charlie has decided to stop moping and “seize the day.” He takes Claire for a picnic. Claire sees some seabirds and suggests putting a message on one so that as the birds migrate, some scientists who tag and track birds might find it. In the process, Claire learns about Desmond’s visions concerning Charlie.
Locke and Danielle want to kill Mikhail, but Sayid and Kate are against it. When reference is made to shooting him like a dog, Locke says “No, I like dogs.”
Mikhail talks about the man who brought him and all of them there being “magnificent,” and about a list that they are not on because of their flaws, making them incapable of understanding why he and others would consider the island home.
They find the sonic fence. Locke pushes Mikhail between the pylons, and Mikhail says “thank you,” and then foams at the mouth and his ears bleed. As they plan to go over one of the pylons, they find that Locke took some C4 explosive from the Flame station. They use a large tree branch to get over a pylon, and they reach the barracks. Kate sees Jack playing football with the Others.
While the episode offered some interesting hints related to mysteries, we never really learn what if anything made Jacob “magnificent.” It would have been interesting to learn more about the impact that Jacob and his cohort had had on history off the island. But it certainly offered interesting exploration of the connections between people, and of how we live in light of the knowledge that our time is short.
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