November 12, 2002:

Ginger and Mary Ann screamed.

Men with weapons, dressed in dark suits and sunglasses, burst into the clearing from three sides.

Gilligan didn't have time to understand. He came running from the storage hut, the castaways' best rope wrapped around one shoulder, ready to rescue the people inside the plane as it ditched in the lagoon. He was too late. An armed man sent him sprawling with an M-16 butt to the nose.

"Face down on the ground!" The armed men were shouting orders. One had his knee in the Professor's back; another bound the Skipper's wrists with painful-looking plastic handcuffs. There was the crackling sound of voices over radios. Someone turned him face-up; the black clouds spun. The armed men wore bulky body-armor beneath their dark suits; they each had an earpiece like a hearing aid in one ear, with a thin white wire. Gilligan heard someone speak: "Inform Potty Mouth the zone is secure." His sight grew dim, and he knew no more.