CHAPTER 5 DanielleIn 1988, according to Danielle, her team shipwrecked on the island. Here is her dialogue put together by some "other" posters (my sad attempt at humor):We were part of a science team (SAYID: A science team armed with rifles). Our ship picked up a transmission -- a voice repeating those numbers. We changed course to investigate. Our vessel was three days out of Tahiti when our instruments malfunctioned. It was night. The storm ... the sounds ... the ship slammed into rocks, ran aground, the hull breached beyond repair. On this island sixteen years ago. There were six of us. My team -- six. At that time, I was already seven months pregnant. So ... we made camp. Dug out this temporary shelter. Temporary. After we shipwrecked, my team continued to search for the transmission source. Some of us continued to search for the meaning of those numbers while we waited for rescue... It was weeks before we found the radio tower...Up by the Black Rock...Nearly two months we survived here. Two months before -- But then the sickness came. The Black Rock is not far. This (territoire fonce = "dark territory") is where it all began. Where my team got infected, where Montaigne lost his arm. We were coming back from the Black Rock. It was them. They were the carriers... I hear them. Out there in the jungle. They whisper. It took them -- one after the other. I had no choice. They were already lost. Robert didn't notice it (firing pin) was missing, either, when I shot him (SAYID: You killed them). What would have happened if we were rescued? I couldn't let that happen. I won't! ...When my team was gone, I went back up to the tower and changed the transmission. I delivered the infant myself. The baby and I were together for only one week when I saw black smoke. A pillar of black smoke five kilometers inland. That night ... they came. They came ... and took her. Alex. They took my baby. It (the music box) was such a comfort to me the first few years here. Sixteen years. Has it really been that long? ...You just happened to hear my distress call?... Broadcasts from somewhere else. But they control it now. They were not here... I just ... wanted my Alex back. I thought ... if I gave them the baby ...I heard them whispering...I heard them say they were coming for the child. The others said they were coming for the boy.Here is the text of her transmission:If anybody can hear this, they are dead, I'll try to go to the Black Rock, Please help us. Please help us. He (or it) is outside, he's (it's) outside, and Brandon took the keys, Please help us. They are dead. They are all dead. They are all dead, please help us... He's (it's) outside, please help us. PLEASE help us. If anybody can hear this, I ask him (most probably not 'it') to go to the Black Rock. Please help us, they are all dead, they are dead. He (it) killed them, he (it) killed them all. I ask him (most probably not 'it') to go to the Black Rock.If we assumehe's (it's)to beit's, thenit'scould mean the disease. And couldit's outsideimply that she is inside a hatch, maybe even one that says "quarantined"? I think it's possible, especially given the "Quarantine" stamp on the tailies hatch door. I also think it possible that Danielle knew who was listening to her distress call, which I assume to be Dharma or Hanso. There would be no need to be more specific if you assume that the person receiving your message already knows exactly who and where you are. So now the question for this line of thinking is whether Danielle was knowingly working for the DI? Also, would this mean her and her team were the next scheduled replacements? Dialogue between Danielle and Sayid also lends some credibility to this line of thinking. When Danielle thinks that Sayid is an "other" in Solitary, she says that he was looking for her to get "answers"... what answers would she have that the "others" would want? If she was not affiliated in any way with Dharma, how could she have answers that the others were seeking...unless, of course, they were seeking answers as to how to get off the island (i.e.; if she got on, we can get off). However, if she was affiliated, she could have the answers they are looking for. Also, how does she know they want answers? However, this dialogue could also link the newly released cease and desist memo from the GHO to Danielle's team. In the memo, the GHO states that they will be arrangingan official inspection of your Zanzibar facility. I cannot possibly overstate the importance of offering this team your most sincere and ongoing assistance. Could Danielle's team have been a similar team the GHO sent to inspect the DI facilities? To me, this makes more sense than her and her team working directly for the DI - they went out looking for some island where research was being conducted, couldn't find it, heard the numbers and BAM!, here they are. This could also partially explain Danielle's guns. If they were going to investigate possible animal/human diseases, hunting rifles would be appropriate to put down any "sick" animals - assuming, of course, that the sick animals were actually animals, not the result of bizarre/unethical/inhumane experiments. It would also explain what answers Danielle could possibly provide the others. IMO, this is my leading theory on Danielle's reason for being on the island. The most baffling part of Danielle's story is that she seems to have had many interactions with the others without seeing them (according to her). Her story about Brendan and the Antenna could almost indicate a direct conflict between her (and her team?) and the others (or the disease). Question time! Was Danielle taken by the others and would this explain her memory lapse? Who is Alex's father? Danielle has stated that the others took her child? But she also says that she has never seen the others. How does she know that they took her, then? Also, assuming that she has not seen the others, how did Danielle work with Ethan Rom to get Claire's baby? What exactly was Danielle's role in kidnapping Claire and Aaron? For example, she says that the others took her child, Alex. Yet she also says that she has never seen the others, only heard their whispers. How does she know who took Alex? Did they leave a business card?