LOST: The meter doesn't stop until you get out, pal.

6.06: "Sundown"

Recap and Ramble on the off-Island happenings from this week's Sayideriffic episode... (For the Island hijinks, click here.)

OUTSIDE THE SNOWGLOBE.

Sayid is hesitant to get out of the cab from the airport. He's about to be reunited with his long lost Nadia... Or so we'd believe, given the previous reality we've learned about. Instead, his true love is married to his brother Omar, who has just opened up a second dry cleaning biz. Together they have two button-cute children and a house in the burbs.

Sayid is dropping by after another tip overseas, translating contracts for an oil company. In the pervious reality, he had just helped U.S. intelligence capture a terrorist, in exchange for Nadia's location. Immediately you have to wonder if this "oil company" thing is just a cover, right? Altho, it wouldn't be for the same scenario we're familiar with, as Sayid clearly knows Nadia's whereabouts. More's the pity.

When Omar excuses himself to take a business call and the kids run off to grab Sayid's presents from Sydney, we discover that there is Nadia clearly returns Sayid's feelings for her, but Sayid has been... resistant, or loyal, or stand-up... in any case, unresponsive.

Of course, that's when the kids return, having discovered their presents—boomerangs—as well as a photograph of Nadia in Sayid's bag. Or maybe I should say, three boomerangs, eh?

We later discover that Sayid2 DOES possess the special forces skills and interrogator past (did he meet Kelvin?) of Sayid1. His brother comes to him for just those skills, asking him to put the hurt on a bad man from whom he borrowed the money to expand his business. Sayid explains to Omar that he's not that man anymore (despite the ninja moves he pulls on him in his sleep at 2:30am, just muscle memory, no doubt), and replies in the negative.

Soon after, Omar is sent to the hospital, the victim of a "mugging." Nadia is clearly aware of Omar's sketchy dealings, and as terrible as the situation is, feels that he brought some kind of retribution on himself for choosing the path that he did. She implores Sayid to stay his vengeful hand and instead take care of the kids, make them feel safe. And he does. He avoids conflict until conflict actually reaches out to him. He's abducted by the bad men, taken to some restaurant kitchen to meet, apparently, the bad man himself—Keamy! Who was really rather fun to see in this pimpy loan shark/mob underboss role. It's wishful thinking, but I wonder if this means that all those LOST1 historical conflicts he served in as military or mercenary didn't happen in LOST2. Is the world a better place all-around, and not just for our Lostaways?

Anyhow, Keamy the loan shark doesn't really know who he's dealing with, and Sayid, when faced with personal threats as well as threats against Omar's family, well, "You wouldn't like me when I'm angry," y'know? Sayid quickly dispatches Keamy's goons and has the Eggman himself at gunpoint, playing it cool, but effectively bargaining for his life. Sayid does the math and simply can't allow the man to live. Bye, Keamy.

Sayid doesn't get more than a few seconds alone with his latest kill when he hears a rattling nearby. Gun at the ready, he tracks it to a walk-in-fridge and inside finds... Jin!

Jin, who in LOST1 was ready to leave the service of Sun's father. Was given one last assignment to complete before that. The delivery of a watch to a certain business colleague in Los Angeles. I wonder how different this scenario is from the previous reality's. In my head, Jin, tied up and gagged by Keamy and his mean in a fridge, tells me that the watch was a message to the recipient to "kill the messenger," like what happens to Rosencrantz and Gildenstern, y'know? Maybe Keamy's a couple rungs down from the man who actually accepted the watch, but he seems like just the guy who'd do the dirty work, right? And it would look like another tragic "mugging" in the lawless wild of L.A.

Man, how much more should Sun hate her father than she already does?

Where things go for Jin and Sayid from here, I don't know. Would be great if the restaurant were full of more thugs and they had to fight their way out, back to back, Sayid and Jin cracking skulls left and right until they get to the street, wave down a cab, and have Kate pick them up, heh.

BOOMERANG SAYID.

I liked the boomerang presents. They apply perfectly to Sayid's dilemma and nature inside and outside the snowglobe. He is a good man with a history of violence, and as much as he works to keep it in the past, the situations of the present(s) demands that he return to it, to dealing violence and death, even if it's as a protector and/or righteous punisher.

SAYID1 vs. SAYID2.

SAYID2: For the last 12 years I've ben trying to wash my hands of all the horrible things I've done. I can't be with you because I don't deserve you.

I wonder what the infected Sayid would say in his place. Something rather opposite and upside down, but no just as emo-rational. I'd imagine it going along the lines of

What-if SAYID1: After all the guilt and shame I've suffered for the horrible things I did, things I did as my duty, and out of loyalty and even love, I've earned the right to a good life and happiness by your side.

In exchange for his aid, Esau offers infected Sayid the chance to be reunited with Nadia. Even as this offer is made inside the snowglobe, outside, we see it on its way to being realized. With Omar out of the picture—physically, assaulted and injured, yes, but even more substantially, shamed and exposed by the outing of his shady dealings with the likes of Keamy and the danger into which he put his family—Sayid of either world is close to being able to live his dream.

Of course, unless Esau has devised a find-and-replace command for dropping Island Lostaways into the outside reality, Sayid1 might only find metaphysical satisfaction in this scenario. Or maybe Esau simply plans to put Sayid1 and Sayid2 in a locked room somewhere...? Same with Claire1 and Claire2, eh? No doubt Claire1 will win that in short order, skewering Claire2 on a dagger made from the dried and sharpened spine of Kate Austen.

Whee! =)

Keep on keepin on~