Lost - Numbers

While you have Michael and Jin-Soo putting forth extra effort to rebuild a raft (and Michael making sure someone is stationed as watch-like sentries to make sure another fire doesn’t burn down the work), Sawyer serves as one of the disgruntled guards finding the banging and work too noisy while attempting to read a novel is disturbed, Locke working on a project with help from very pregnant Claire which might just involve her baby, Sun-Hwa worriedly conversing with Kate about her husband’s estrangement from her, and others involved in island activities, Hurley becomes fixated on a sequence of numbers found scribbled by Rousseau on paper taken by Sayid when he escaped from her kidnap. We see why: back in his civilian life, Hurley used those very same sequence of numbers (when provided by a guy named Leonard, spending his time lost in a fog of mental derangement in a hospital) to win the lottery, but in doing so has seemingly [and extraordinarily, it seems] brought on himself a curse that causes harm to all those around him! Even at the very end, when Charlie shares a difficult secret with him regarding “snorting heroine”, Hurley tells him how much his worth is back home (100+ million!), resulting in the same rolling eyes and rejection others gave him when he persisted about how a curse is put on him. Hurley even considers the plane crash a result of the numbers. Leonard and a fellow Navy officer named Sam, received a transmission where those very numbers were picked up. Sam used those numbers regarding a supposed “bean counting scam” resulting in a similar curse that even possibly instigated a car crash that took his wife’s leg. Leonard is lost in a fog when Hurley visits him until the revelation of the lottery win breaks him out of it. To be blissfully lost in the fog was probably his refuge. This deluge of trouble all around Hurley (grandpa worked for 52 years, three jobs, and was past 70 years old when he drops dead of a coronary, mother snaps her ankle on a sidewalk trip, the police believe he’s a criminal, his relative’s wife left him, and his newly bought mansion goes up in flames!) motivates him to find Sam in Australia, when he locates his wife who tells him of Sam’s suicide. The trip back on the plane that lands on the island gives Hurley increasing belief that the curse caused the crash. Charlie scoffs at him and the truth of his worth back home, considering Hurley’s “inability to just tell him the truth” an evasive defiance…Hurley can only accept that even when he tells the truth it isn’t considered so. Hurley does meet Rousseau after pursuing her whereabouts while Sayid, Jack, and Charlie follow behind to try and catch up to him before he places himself in danger. He does put himself in harm’s way but Hurley does find what he’s looking for: Rousseau indicates where she discovered the sequence of numbers, received by her group of scientists from a transmission. This sequence also cost her so much loss, including a “sickness” that took her own party. Hurley just needed someone to believe he was cursed, even hugging her when she agrees!

Numbers finally provides back story for Hurley, and it was a long time coming. And that his back story could be key to why the plane crashed on the island in the first place is quite a twist! It makes the case, that’s for sure. This guy endures his share of bad luck scenarios. Finding Rousseau was a nice return for Furlan and Hurley meeting her set up an interesting link to why people might find themselves on this peculiar island in the first place. That a sequence of “unlucky” numbers could be the catalyst is quite a seed planted. Why are these numbers so accursed? What is so special about them that these numbers would cause such difficulty towards those that might use them for an advantage? With Hurley taking a chance by removing his foot from a trap that would hurl a “wad of spikes” or crossing a very intimidating bridge to get to Rousseau, he tempts fate but somehow avoids grave danger. Even as Rousseau fires at him and Charlie, he almost acts as if he’s impervious. Whatever the case, Hurley sure seems touched by good luck even as those around him might not be so fortunate…

The drive Michael has for forging ahead despite the setback of the first raft's burning says a lot about his desire to get off the island. He beckons for a battery that might help cast a signal to anyone that might be even remotely close out there somewhere while the raft is being rebuilt anew. Hurley takes up his quest to find the battery, but the piece of paper with the numbers truly is what spurns him forward. It was a quest he ultimately found some assurance in the outcome.