At dawn, Charlie surveyed the Others' beach camp from above. Kate's tracking had led them here. There were a few crude huts, about thirty people of varying ages, two or three weapons, and two guards posted outside a hatch set into the side of the hill. Walt, Ron, and Hermione were nowhere in sight. A glance to the side showed him everyone in his group making their own assessments. He could guess what they were thinking: this would be a piece of cake.

"They're probably in the hatch," Sayid said in a low voice. He regarded Harry and Ginny. "I do not know your capabilities," he told them, "so perhaps you should devise your own plan of attack. Wait for my signal." The wizards nodded and moved away. Charlie took their spot to be in on the discussion.

"Shouldn't we know what they're going to do?" Jack queried.

"Ordinarily, yes," he agreed. "But it would take more time for them to explain to us than for us to actually attack." Seeing that Jack was unconvinced, he added, "I trust them to know what they're doing and to stay out of our way."

"So what's the plan?" Charlie asked over Jack's next protest.

"Having seen it," Sayid thought aloud, "and knowing what we're up against…We need to take out those with weapons first. Do not kill everyone, we need information." Charlie shifted uncomfortably as he remembered Ethan.

Sayid explained quickly what he wanted each of them to do, and then they set off. Charlie tried to make his way down the ridge silently, but he kept kicking small pebbles down the side. It was slightly eerie to finally be attacking the Others, with hardly any preparation or notice.

He was several yards above and almost directly over the hatch doors when one of his inadvertently kicked pebbles stumbled down the hill and tapped one of the guards on the head. Charlie pressed himself against the hill as the guard looked up, hoping against hope that the man wouldn't see him, and crazily thinking that Harry's invisibility cloak would have come in handy right about now. As the guard aimed his gun at him, he had a second crazy thought, that none of their plans ever seemed to go right, so why bother planning them at all, and then BLAM!

Charlie yelled in surprise, lost his footing, and slid a few feet down the hill. He shut his eyes and sent up a quick prayer, but a second shot never came. He looked down in confusion, only to find that the guards were just as confused. Their guns were flying away from them.

Suddenly two jets of red light hit them in the chest, and they folded to the ground. "CHARLIE GET DOWN THERE!" someone shouted at him, he never figured out who. He slid the rest of the way to the ground and stumbled away from the hatch doors. A teenager ran past him. He raised his gun. She looked back, terrified.

He lowered it. She escaped from the camp.

And then the hatch exploded.

Sawyer saw Charlie fall down the hill from the corner of his eye. That's not exactly what he'd meant by "get down" but in the confusion of voices, he wasn't surprised. Charlie must have been confused by the mix of Kate's "Charlie," Jack's "get out of there," and his own order.

Firing shot after shot, he recognized the chaos of the Others' camp as the chaos of a knocked-down ant hill. It was insanity personified, but he couldn't shake the feeling that it was a trap.

A quick scan of the "battlefield" showed him that they were winning. Odd. The Others had scattered, hadn't put up much of a fight at all. They didn't even try to pick up the weapons of their fallen comrades.

Hostages had to be held somewhere. Probably in the hatch, but there was no harm in checking the huts.

He ducked into one of them. It was empty. Except for a striped snake. According to the poem ("red next to black, you're okay Jack; red next to yellow, you're a dead fellow"), it was poisonous.

Ginny Stunned one of the hatch guards as Harry Stunned the other. They waited until Charlie was out of the way, and then blasted the hatch doors open. When the smoke cleared, the only thing behind the doors was the rock face of the hill.

"You don't think we caused a cave in, do you?" Ginny asked as they inspected it.

"No, look, the frames just grafted on. It's not a real hatch at all!"

"Then what -?" She broke off to disarm an approaching girl with dark hair, but she hadn't been carrying a weapon.

"Come with me, quickly!" she called to them and waved for them to follow. "Your friends are this way!"

Against her better judgment, Ginny tightened her grip on her wand and set off, Harry right beside her.

"Why are we doing this?" he asked.

"Nothing better to do," she joked.

They dodged opponents and friends alike. To outsiders, it looked like they were chasing the girl. She led them to a hut in the middle of a small cluster. Sawyer stormed out of one of the huts next to it.

He saw the girl and raised his gun to shoot her.

"NO!" screamed Ginny.

"Oh, come on!" he fumed. "Why not?"

"I am helping you," the girl said, and lifted the door flap.

"Ron!" Ginny shrieked, and ran inside to hug her brother. Ron and Hermione were bound and gagged, and incidentally, sitting on opposite sides of the hut. Harry couldn't help grinning at their ability to still be annoyed at each other when their lives were in danger.

Ginny severed the ties and led them out of the hut.

"Hey, thanks Alex," Ron said, rubbing his wrists. Hermione glared at him, but he didn't seem to notice.

"Where's Walt?" Sawyer demanded, his gun still aimed at the girl.

"He's not here," she told him. "He was removed when his purpose was fulfilled."

A sharp lull in the fighting made the click of the gun as Sawyer loaded the next round sound uncomfortably loud.

"What's that?" asked Harry, distracted by sounds of shouting in the next hut.

"Check it," Sawyer ordered him, eyes never leaving Alex.

The wizards all crowded around the door and looked in. "Hey, what's going on! Where's my boy!" It was another hostage.

Hermione managed to calm him down enough to get his name, then turned back to Sawyer. "Know anyone named Michael?" she asked him.

Kate looked around one last time. The fighting was pretty much over. Everyone had fled, after running around in circles for ten minutes first.

"Something's wrong," Sayid told her.

"Yeah, but what?"

"Is everyone okay?" Jack asked. He checked Kate's bandage. The bleeding had started again.

"Just a little rocky," Charlie put in.

"Where's Sawyer?" As one, the small group turned to the cluster of huts and took in the situation. Sawyer had his gun pointed at a girl's head. The wizards were looking between them, then rushed over to one of the huts and looked inside.

In the next instant, Sawyer had collapsed on the ground, jerking uncontrollably. The girl he'd held at gunpoint disappeared into the jungle.

Kate looked up at the ridge. There were maybe a dozen people, firing down on them. The only real cover was the huts. She ran toward them, everyone else following her. They ducked behind them, occasionally looking out to shoot and to see if the situation had improved. If anything, it had worsened, the people on the ridge seemed to be multiplying, and spreading further down the hill.

"Can you hit them?" Jack asked the wizards.

Harry tried to Stun them, but nothing happened. "Too far away," Hermione gasped.

"This is not good," Kate said. "How are we going to get back? If we move, they'll have a clear shot, and we'll end up like him," she added looking at Sawyer, who had stopped moving.

Even though the situation was hopeless, Harry thought he could hear phoenix song, and it suddenly didn't seem so bad.

"What's that?" asked Charlie, pointing straight up.

Everyone looked. But only half of them recognized it.

"FAWKES!" shouted Harry. He sent up some red and gold sparks. Fawkes cried out a greeting. He dived down, neatly coming to rest in front of Harry, who rested a hand gently on his head for a moment.

"Quick," he said, "everyone link hands. Someone get Sawyer." He waited until everyone was holding hands, put out his own hand, then hesitated as he watched the jungle. It looked like hundreds of figures, including dementors, were charging out of the jungle at them.

He grabbed hold of Fawkes, and as he felt the phoenix prepare to fly, locked eyes with one of the figures.

"SIRIUS!" he shouted. But they were gone.