The Time Sickness, and why only Desmond is affected.
+7 13 Votes
Rate it:
By KevinJohnson
- The Time Sickness, and why only Desmond is affected.
- Created: Apr 11, 2008
- Last updated: Aug 14, 2008
- After episode: 4.5: The Constant
- Status: Current
- Flag this theory:
I think the episode ‘the Constant’ went a long way towards explaining what the sickness Rousseau referred to was, I know other people on the site have made that connection but heres my take on it.
I seems to affect people passing through the ‘barrier’ (possibly electromagnetic) which surrounds the immediate area around the island but it has not, so far, affected the 815 surviours. I think this is either because when they arrived the ‘system failure’ in the Swan either made them immune or disrupted the barrier somehow.
Now a lot of people believe it began for Desmond when he turned the fail safe key, I don’t think it did. When Desmond turned the key, it did send him back in time, however not in the same way as he travelled back in the Constant.
In ‘Flashes before your eyes’, he returned to the past with full memory of his life on the island, and remained there until getting cracked on the head sent him back to the present. I think that he was simply experienced a massive episode of the time sickness after being exposed to the electromagnetism when he turned the key , but this was not the direct cause of his experiences afterwoods.
I think that Desmond would have experienced flashes of the future from the moment he washed up on the island, had he not been found immediately by Kelvin. Kelvin rushed him to the Hatch and then instructed him to inject himself with the Dharma vaccine, every nine days stating ‘I hope its not too late’.
After leaving the Hatch, Desmond ceased to use the vaccine (upon noticing Claire injecting it he states that she is wasting her time and he shot himself with it every nine days for 3 years, indicating that he doesn’t anymore) and then his future flashes began.
We also know from the Man Behind the Curtain that the Dharma Intiative had all of their employees inject theirselves with the vaccine, probably because their method of travel to and from the island was the submarine, the producers have hinted that Bens people have another method of travel and they simply kept the submarine as ruse to make their recruits think it was how they were brought th
Key locations
| Theme | Relevant Episodes | Theories |
|---|---|---|
| The Swan station | 2.20, 2.23, 2.14, 2.17, 2.1, 2.2, 1.11, 3.3, 3.8 | 469 |
I like your ideas KevinJohnson. They’re possibly brought to the island in that unique way and placed in the submarine hence why Ben said “The submarine maintains that illusion” back in season three when he was talking to John Locke.
Nice work KJ i have also argued that what happened in flashes is different to the side effects but never tied it into the vaccine. +1
May be it depends on how far are you deviating from 325?
May be currents around the island, that natural way of drifting is also the safest way of getting to the island, may be currents coincide with 325? That would explain why Michael, Jin and Sawyer did not get that disease…
Anyway there are too many holes in this theory…
I think this is a good idea, showing the possible effect /benefit of taking the vaccine, and the consequences of not taking it. Desmond did arrive in a different manner than the Losties, wasn’t it during an electromagnetic storm?
He’d already been having his mind-travel episodes prior to his arrival on the island, per the flashbacks we’ve seen, yet apparently none while in the hatch (esp. given he had to push a button every 108 minutes). His last injection likely would have been on the boat as he tried to leave the island, or shortly after his return, then he would still have been protected until the next due shot 9 days later, after which the protection would have gradually worn off. So it does make sense!
Also, didn’t Rousseaus’ team arrive during a storm as well, likely with the men on deck battling it while a pregnant woman would have been down below?
I like some of the ideas here. I’m not sure I can take the idea that the vaccine prevents flashes of the future; your logic works here, but the concept itself doesn’t for me. (I’ve taken to the idea that the vaccine works as immunisation against ‘visions of the dead, etc, but given that Ben was probably being immunised and saw his dead mother maybe that hunch is wrong and your ideas carry more weight.) +1
Hm… +1
…”your logic works here” indeed.
Really?
This would seem plausible, that what gets ejected every 108 minutes eventually becomes the storm, which is a barrier of protection, which Dharma made an antidote for, which is what makes you sick…………and then everything you said KevinJohnson…