Ethan Rom was first introduced in s1-ep10 'Raised by Another'. After Claire woke up screaming that she had been attacked by a strange man who held her down and stabbed her in the stomach with a needle, Jack and Hurley joined other survivors in a search for her assailant. Hurley convinces Jack that they needed to start a registry of the survivors on the island, to know who each person was and to hopefully prevent further attacks. The next day, Hurley begins to question all of the survivors and writes down their names and places of residence before the crash, along with their reasons for traveling to Australia. Hurley first approached Ethan while he was picking papayas. After confusing Ethan with Lance, Hurley learned that Ethan's last name was Rom and that he was from Ontario. When Hurley came to Boone and Shannon and began to get their information, Boone tells Hurley that his life would be much easier if he had the manifest from the plane. Boone said they had crossed out all the names of the dead after they burned the fuselage, and that the list should be a full roster of the remaining survivors. Hurley learned that Sawyer had the manifest and convinced him to turn it over. Charlie and Claire were in the jungle when she started having labor pains. Charlie found Ethan gathering firewood and told Ethan to run to the caves for Jack. Charlie told Ethan that Claire was having the baby, and that he would stay with her while Ethan got Jack. When Jack didn't return, Claire and Charlie headed back for the caves, thinking that Claire was in false labor caused by stress. Meanwhile, Hurley found Jack in the caves and told him that the census had been completed, but that one person he interviewed was not on the manifest, meaning he could not have been on the plane...Ethan Rom. We then see Ethan confront Claire and Charlie in the jungle.
In s1-ep11 'All the Best Cowboys Have Daddy Issues', Locke and Jack go into the jungle in search of Claire and Charlie and find signs of a struggle. Jack asks Locke which way Ethan went, and Locke points into the jungle. Jack runs in that direction. Locke returns to the caves and meets up with Kate, who tells him she is coming with him to find Jack, Claire and Charlie. Boone volunteers to join the search party and Locke agrees. The three set out into the jungle and soon find Jack, who has been running in a circle. Locke takes over the lead and they continue their journey. Jack tells Kate that he feels responsible for Claire and Charlie's disappearance, because he didn't believe Claire when she said she had been attacked at the caves. They find a piece of tape with the letter L on it and realize it came from Charlie's taped fingers, and that he must be leaving them a trail. The group pushes on, until they come to a spot where it appears that two trails go off in different directions. Kate and Jack take one trail, while Boone and Locke go off onto the other. After tracking the trail for a distance, Jack and Kate discover another piece of tape with the letter T on it. They hear a sound that resembles Claire's screams and Jack takes off in the direction of the voice. As he is running, he is confronted by Ethan, who tells Jack, "If you do not stop following me, I will kill one of them. Do you understand?" They fight and Jack is beaten badly. Ethan says "No more warnings" before disappearing. Kate discovers Jack lying in the mud and he tells her about his meeting with Ethan. Continuing their search, the two come to a clearing and discover Charlie hanging by his neck from a tree limb. Only the letter E remains on his fingers. Kate climbs the tree to cut the vines holding Charlie up, while Jack raises Charlie's body to relieve the pressure on his neck. When they finally get him down, Charlie is not breathing. Jack frantically tries to do CPR on Charlie in an attempt to revive him but is unsuccessful, until he begins pounding on Charlie's chest. Charlie suddenly gasps for breath and is conscious once again. Back at the caves later, Jack is questioning Charlie about what happened, and Charlie says that he can't remember anything, before saying "That's all they wanted. All they wanted was Claire."
Claire returns alone to the survivors at the end of s1-ep14 'Special'. In s1-ep15 'Homecoming', and they discover that she not only has no memory of being kidnapped, but she also doesn't remember anything or anyone since she had been on Oceanic Flight 815. Charlie gives Claire her journal to help her remember the events that had happened since the crash. While on his way back to the caves from the beach, Charlie talks to Jin about the insanity on the island. They hear a whirring sound and Jin is hit with a rock and collapses. Ethan appears in front of Charlie and tells him, "Charlie, I want her back." They struggle before Ethan grabs Charlie by the neck and pins him against a tree. Ethan tells him, "You bring her here. If you don't, I'm going to kill one of them. And then if you don't bring her back before sundown tomorrow I'll kill another, and another, another. One everyday. And Charlie, I'll kill you last." Locke, Sayid and Boone set up a perimeter trip wire signal around the camp and organize shifts to guard the survivors during the night. Boone is falling asleep when he hears a bag of garbage fall, indicating that a wire had been tripped. He runs to investigate it and trips, and Vincent comes up and licks his face. Sayid meets up with him and they hear a woman screaming from the beach. Running back there, they discover a body lying in the sand. It is the body of Scott, first misidentified as Steve. His neck, arms and all his fingers had been broken. Scott was buried on the island. Later, Jack approaches Locke and asks if he would be able to track Ethan from the spot where he attacked Jin and Charlie. Jack shows Locke the guns from the Marshal's case and says this is their way to get the advantage back from Ethan.
Jack, Sayid and Locke formulate a plan to lure Ethan out of hiding by using Claire as bait. Since they have 4 guns, they ask Sawyer to join them in lying in wait for Ethan to capture him when he comes for Claire. Kate says she also wants to go but Jack refuses, saying that no one will go out there unarmed. Sawyer produces a fifth gun that he had taken from the Marshal and gives it to Kate to use. They take Claire into the jungle and she stands in a clearing, waiting in the rain to see if Ethan will show up. Sayid hides up in a tree, while Sawyer, Jack and Locke hide on the ground. Ethan enters the clearing and starts chasing Claire, before being tackled by Jack. As the two of them fight, Jack loses his gun and the others come to help Jack with Ethan. Jack overpowers Ethan and the group point their guns at him as he starts to get up. Sawyer tells him "Uh, uh, uh, jungle boy. Not even for one second." Gunshots ring out and Ethan is shot in the chest 6 times. The survivors are stunned to see Charlie holding the gun lost by Jack. When Jack later asks Charlie why he shot Ethan, Charlie answered "Because he deserved to die."
In s2-ep15 'Maternity Leave', Claire begins having flashbacks to the time when she was kidnapped. She remembers Ethan being with her in the Dharma Cadeceus Station giving her an examination, before injecting her with an unknown substance. Ethan gives Claire a needle through her abdomen, telling her that the baby needs it. When he is finished, he tells her that since she has been such a good girl, he has a surprise for her. He leads Claire to another room in the station which has been outfitted as a nursery for the baby. When she asks about Charlie, Ethan tells her that Charlie is fine, that he let him go back after they got far enough away from the camp. Claire is amazed by the nursery and asks where everything came from, but Ethan tells her that while he would love to explain everything to her, he thinks it would be a little overwhelming for her at the moment. He is then summoned to the hallway by a man, who speaks crossly to Ethan. The man asks Ethan ,"What the hell happened? You were supposed to make the list and then bring her in. Was I unclear?" Ethan answers, "It's not my fault. They knew I wasn't on the plane. They had a manifest." The man is revealed to be Mr. Friendly, from the boat that took Walt and the confrontation at the Ring of Fire in the jungle. He says, "What am I supposed to tell him? You know what he's going to do when he finds out. Damn it, Ethan." Mr. Friendly notices Claire listening and closes the door. Later, Ethan comes to Claire as she is knitting a baby bootie and asks her if she would like to talk a walk with him. When they go outside the station, Ethan apologizes for not being able to let her outside sooner, but says his friends were afraid that Claire would run away. As they sit down on a log, Ethan offers Claire a drink from his canteen, but she tells him the liquid is sour. He tells her that he hadn't noticed, as he sniffs the contents and then screws the lid back onto the canteen. Ethan tells Claire that he is going to miss her and wishes she didn't have to go. Claire asks if she can stay, but Ethan reminds her that they have talked before about that not being possible, that there is not enough vaccine for both her and the baby. He tells her that once she delivers the baby, she'll return to her friends. Claire asks Ethan "What if I want to see the baby?” and he replies, "Hey, nobody's going to take him from you unless that's what you want. You have a choice. We're good people, Claire. We're a good family. But if you're going to trust us with your child I want you to be sure. Okay?" Later, we see Claire sleeping in the station when she is awakened by a teenaged girl who is urging her to leave. Claire struggles with the girl and demands to see Ethan, but the girl drugs her by holding a rag over her face. When Claire next awakens, she is in the jungle alone and begins calling out for Ethan, telling him, "Ethan. Ethan. Ethan, I'm sure. Ethan. Hey, Ethan! Ethan! I'm sure. I want you to take the baby." Ethan calls back that he can hear her, and is coming. Danielle approaches Claire at this point and knocks her out to keep her quiet, so they can avoid Ethan and his friends.
Goodwin was first introduced in s2-ep7 'The Other 48 Days'. After the tail section of Oceanic Flight 815 crashed into the ocean off the northeast coast of the island, survivors struggled to get to shore and assess their conditions. Goodwin appeared near the treeline calling out for help, saying that there was someone in the jungle. Ana Lucia ran to help him and they discovered Bernard strapped into an airline seat high in a tree, with a dead body strapped into the seat next to him. Goodwin wants to climb the tree to rescue Bernard, but Ana stops him and calls to Bernard to unbuckle his seatbelt and grab the nearest branch. As he does, the seats fall, and Ana climbs up to rescue Bernard. Later, Goodwin is on the beach trying to start a fire with a hand drill type device. Ana approaches and asks him why he didn't use matches. He says he couldn't find any dry ones, and he wanted to start a signal fire before it got dark. When Ana jokingly asks if he is a boy scout, Goodwin replies, "Grown up version - I'm in the Peace Corps." After the group was attacked by the Others the second time, and the children from the plane, Zach and Emma, were taken, an Army knife and list of the survivors names from the crash were found on the body of one of the Others whom Ana killed. Libby suggested that they leave the beach, since the Others knew they were there. Ana asked Goodwin about the signal fire, and he replied "I think it's time we let it go out."
After Ana suspected Nathan of being an Other and imprisoned him in the pit she dug in the jungle, Goodwin tried to talk to her about letting Nathan go but she refused. Later that night, Goodwin opened the pit door and pulled Nathan up. Goodwin told Nathan that they were afraid Ana Lucia was going to hurt him, and that he should go. He gave him a package of fruit and pointed him in the direction of the beach, before suddenly reaching out and snapping Nathan's neck, killing him. When the tailies discovered the Dharma Arrow Station in the jungle, Goodwin said they couldn't get a signal from the radio they found in the station because the hills were blocking it. He says that he will take it to higher ground to try, and Ana tells him that she will come with him.
As they hike, they begin to talk about the Others and their possible reasons for attacking the tailies. Goodwin tells Ana that the Others may not be attacking the tailies. They stopped for a break and Goodwin asked Ana for the knife so he can peel some fruit. While they talk, Ana asks Goodwin how he found Bernard in the tree the day of the crash. He first tells her that he heard Bernard calling from the beach, but when Ana continues her questioning and remarks that Goodwin wasn't wet when he ran out of the jungle 10 minutes after the crash, Goodwin begins to answer Ana differently. Ana starts to ask Goodwin about Nathan, and Goodwin answers, "If you had cut off his finger and he still told you he was on the plane, I think maybe you would have started to believe you had the wrong guy." When Ana asked if Goodwin killed Nathan, Goodwin said "Nathan was not a good person. That's why he wasn't on the list." Ana asks Goodwin, "What about the kids? Did you kill them, too?" and Goodwin replies, "Children are fine. They're better off now." Ana and Goodwin begin to fight and Ana impales Goodwin as he falls down a hill.
Both Ethan and Goodwin infiltrated the survivor’s camps on the island. They both were involved in using lists of the survivor’s names, and with trying to secure children for their group. A direct connection between them has not been established as of this time, although it appears very likely. However, their purpose for doing these things has not been revealed.
