Touch me, touch me, I want to feel your body by ZutAlurs

So, I've had theories from the beginning of my time watching Lost (I started watching right after the series 2 finale). But my theories have always been kind of vague and nebulous because I never took the time to write them down. Now that we're in the home stretch to the answers, I think things are starting to really come together and the pieces are falling into place, so I wanted to start really firming up my own thoughts.

These are my thoughts about what we can expect to see as some of the answers to be revealed in the coming episodes. Of course it goes without saying that these are just my thoughts and if you think I'm way off base, feel free to tell me so. Reading other people's theories and thoughts really helps me firm things up in my mind.

I'll start with an easy one, why Smokey is now "trapped" in Locke's form. Of course we know that he isn't actually "trapped" at all, but merely that he can't take on the form of anyone else now, at least according to Ilana. I think we can believe her on this, because of the way that information was delivered to us. I believe the reason Smokey is now "trapped" is because Locke's body was on the Ajira flight as a proxy for Christian. I do think that Smokey is actually using Locke's real body, and not just solidifying his smoke-mass into the form of Locke's body. It took me a while to let myself believe this, because I kept wondering how he could be using the physical body when we saw Locke's physical corpse and they even buried it. But I now think that somehow, Smokey has replaced Locke's physical body with that of Christian Shepherd's. That's why Locke had to be sent back as a proxy, so that Smokey could could actually take on his persona. Do I think Ms Hawking is in-line wit! h Smokey? Not necessarily, at least not consciously. I think there's a good chance that she had been duped into telling Jack to bring back Locke's body, and she may not have realized what she was doing when she did.

I believe before Locke's physical body was returned to the island, Smokey was trapped in Alex's body. Before he took her form, he was trapped in Christian's body. Before Christian's body made it's way onto the island, he was trapped in Yemi's, etc etc back to the MIB body we saw in The Incident. Each time a new body comes to the island, Smokey can choose to take on the new physical body, and then replace it with a doppelganger, but when he does, he is then stuck in that form until a fresh corpse arrives for him to utilize.

So, this is all well and good for an explanation of Ilana's statement, but is that all this theory resolves? I don't think so. I think this "rule" also relates back to Jacob and the game he and the MIB are playing. I have a feeling that Smokey can only take over the bodies of candidates, or to be more specific those people that Jacob touches. Jacob seems to have a power in his touch and somehow by touching them he marks them as "special" in some way. Almost like passing a virus, his touch then also makes them vulnerable to the MIB. Have you ever been in a tent when it is raining? If you have, you know not to touch the top of the tent because where you touch the fabric suddenly becomes a place where the rain water can start leaking through. Something about the oils on your skin react with the fabric and water and an impervious tent suddenly becomes receptive to the rain. I think something similar happens when Jacob touches people. Suddenly, they are marked and become receptiv! e. Jacob needs them to be receptive so he can draw them to the island, but that also makes them "receptive" to being controlled by Smokey. Luckily for the people Jacob touches, Smokey doesn't seem to be able to posses them until they are dead.

I also think there are some stipulations about him not being able to attack or kill unless certain requirements are met either. Notice in the Temple, he didn't come after Bram and his team until they had opened fire on him. And the first thing Richard warns when he sees Flocke come out of the Temple is for the Others not to shoot at him. He knows that Flocke won't be able to take Smoke form and destroy them so long as they don't draw first blood, so to speak. I don't recall what led to Smokey attacking Ecko, but I do remember thinking that Ecko somehow allowed it to happen through his words or actions at the time. Smokey didn't just strike first. There's something very similar in the encounter between Ecko and Yemi/Smokey to the moment between Jacob and Ben right before Ben stabs Jacob, I just haven't been able to rewatch the Ecko scene to pin it down, but I do think it relates.

So, in a more round about way than I originally intended, this is my theory. Smokey can only inhabit one body at a time. That body has to have been "touched" by Jacob. When he takes on a new body, he has to replace it with his previous body, which means that Christian, Yemi, and anyone else we see that has really been Smokey in disguise, was someone that Jacob touched and brought to the island. And finally, Smokey can only react, he can never initiate violence on his own.

Please, feel free to shoot my theory full of holes and tell me what you think. If I get some good feedback, meaning constructive, either positive or negative, criticism then I'll post some more theories.