In Season Two, we saw a scene of the kids after they'd been kidnapped from the the Tailies' camp. They were barefoot, dirty, and one was still carrying his teddy bear (and it had a bandaged limb).

In Season Three, they showed up to look at Jack in his cage. They looked clean and well-clothed.

I'm not sure if they were visible in the migrating camp when Locke was told to kill his father.

So, what do you think is their story?

Have they been processed through the brain-washing room at the Hydra Station?

Are some of them still wandering around on the other side of the island, shoeless and in rags?

added later:
I just remembered. When Locke rescued Eko from the bear cave, there were children's toys scattered around (plastic trucks and a dump truck, I think).

How would the bear (or bears) get hold of the toys?
From the Barracks, while the Others weren't there and the sonic fence was turned off?

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charlie98210
"Whoa!" she said. "Cry 'Havoc!' And let loose the dogs of war!"
And, like Banquo's ghost, they just won't go away.

Since no one has posted, I'll give it a try.

Including Goodwin, the two Others Eko killed, and the one that Ana Lucia killed, the group that kidnapped the children originally numbered ten or more. I base this number in the fact that it would take at least three or four people to carry away the children and guard them. The stewardess was kidnapped last...the "voices" in the air acting as a sort of diversion to cover her capture.

The people in the group that Eko and Jin saw, were the children and their guards. The children were being taken to the other side of the island, where they could be transported to the Hydra Station. It was just a coincidence that Ana Lucia was leading the Tailies in the same general direction--enabling the Others who were moving the children to capture the airline stewardess (who, I think, was brainwashed in that building Carl was in, so she would become the children's chaperone).

I also think that the children have all undergone some brainwashing, so that they now consider themselves as having always been on the island. And brainwashed into thinking that they have always been raised and been a part of Ben's group.

They might even have had the idea that they were born on the island implanted in their minds (like Ben's conceit, that he was born on the island). And the memories of their previous lives and parents and families have either been blocked or suppressed or distorted to fit with the idea that everything they can remember "happened on the island."

Does this sound logical?

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charlie98210
"Whoa!" she said. "Cry 'Havoc!' And let loose the dogs of war!"
And, like Banquo's ghost, they just won't go away.

I like the idea Charlie... and if you think about it, since Smokey seems to scan brains, perhaps leaving those born on the island alone, if the kids did believe they were born there, they are free from smokey's wrath.

I hadn't thought of that.

I would add that smokey seems to leave those who it thinks "belong" on the island alone, too.

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charlie98210
"Whoa!" she said. "Cry 'Havoc!' And let loose the dogs of war!"
And, like Banquo's ghost, they just won't go away.

yup, that's why all the Others dress in old clothes. I guess anyway.

Except Mikhail. He still wears his Dharma duds.

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charlie98210
"Whoa!" she said. "Cry 'Havoc!' And let loose the dogs of war!"
And, like Banquo's ghost, they just won't go away.

RIGHT... which would make me believe that since he has NO FEAR of smokey, smokey lets him be, or that Smokey doesn't attack Dharma dudes (which I find hard to believe) or that Smokey has 'killed' Mikhail so many times, and is freaked out seeing him running around again, he has given up. I'm taking the latter.

Just thought of something else.

When the stewardess (Cindy?) showed up at the bear cages with the children to see Jack, she did not know that Ana Lucia was dead (or the rest of the tailies, except for Eko--not dead yet--and Bernard). Obviously Cindy thought the Others were leaving the plane survivors alone (or helping them by sending supplies--the airdrop).

Also, when she and the children leave, one boy remains standing there, staring at Jack, holding a stuffed teddy bear with a bandaged limb. Cindy comes back and leads him away.

The children are all clean, well-groomed, and well-clothed. I think the writers put in the bit with the boy at the end to underline the fact that the children were the ones who were kidnapped from the group of survivors from the tail section of the plane (using the presence of that bandaged teddy bear).

As I recall, the boy also looked at Jack woefully...perhaps wanting to talk to Jack and get some answers to calm his fears over what was happening?

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charlie98210
"Whoa!" she said. "Cry 'Havoc!' And let loose the dogs of war!"
And, like Banquo's ghost, they just won't go away.

I really don't know what to think of this yet. Are the children brainwashed to the ways of the Others, or are their brains still mallable and have accepted life as an Other. Was this ben's doing ("Don't worry, no one will get hurt, we've been doing this for a LONG time John!" in Ben's tent) or had the Others always done this.

The guy that took an interest in Ben when ben first arrived with Uncle Rico, and was there the day Ben's Mom died, seemed to convey that Dharma like having children on the island as well. Perhaps the island would favor children when the children accept the island as their own, and can bestow gifts on the children, like Richard Alperts anti aging. i believe Jacob is a child as well, so having children within your group is probably a plus, though, getting children is made all the more difficult because of the pregnancy=death problem.

Anyway, Cindy, she seems to be a surrogate mother of the children, and perhaps they've trusted her from the beginning because she was the one who payed some attention to them on the plane and after the crash. However, was she part of the Dharma plan, I tend to think not. I believe the Others grabbed the kids, and they were frightened and were asked by Richard or Ben, who do you like? and the children said "the short haired one, with the funny accent", so the Others grabbed her. My biggest question is, what were the Others going to do to juliette if they were allowing the kids to 'watch'. I mean, I guess the Others are not a politically correct society, since it seemed to be a trial which would not have ended pleasantly for our fertility doctor... but, who knows!

ok, so i did have some thoughts on the subject, but nothing concrete, like Lost, I just made more questions than answers...