Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | 0 USERS: N/A YOU GRADE IT Crushed Velvet
By M. Giant | Season 6 | Episode 1 | Aired on January 13, 2007
Inside the hangar, Curtis leads Kiefer to sit in an office chair set up at a table with a desk lamp on it, which is shining down at a perfectly civilized angle. Buchanan comes in and tells Kiefer that "President Palmer wants to speak with you as soon as we debrief." Kiefer's eyes register confusion, and what I assume is horror. Buchanan realizes that Kiefer probably doesn't know that Wayne Palmer is POTUS now. Kiefer throws up in his mouth a little at the news. Twenty months he underwent horrific torture for the sake of his country, and then his country goes and does this. At 6:10:36, Buchanan opens a folder on the table and gives Kiefer the sitch: in the wake of all the recent terrorist attacks, they need to get Hamri Al-Assad. And one of Assad's men offered to give up Assad, in exchange for $25 million and Kiefer. Buchanan shows Kiefer a photo of the man in question, one Abu Fayed, who "wants his pound of flesh for what happened in Beirut." (We'll earn more about what happened in Beirut later this hour.) Buchanan says that they tried everything else ("How about $50 million and a DNA sample? What about $75 million and a full-length cardboard cutout?"), but Fayed was adamant. Curtis adds that since Fayed also demanded temporary access to all of CTU's surveillance systems, they can't get Kiefer back once they've handed him over. Buchanan sums up: "We're asking you to sacrifice yourself so we can eliminate Assad." After a long moment, Kiefer opens his mouth to utter his first word in twenty months: "Audrey?" Interesting choice. Buchanan says that Audrey doesn't know Kiefer's back, and neither does Spawn. "You keep it that way," Kiefer says, with a hard look at Buchanan. He looks down again, and quietly tells Curtis that he can put his gun away: "Before we do this, I would like to clean up." Curtis directs him to a little area they've curtained off, which actually looks kind of homey, with toiletries and a mirror and a water basin and everything. Kiefer looks at himself -- probably for the first time in a while -- and strips off his pajama jacket, revealing a horribly scarred torso. Many of the wounds are still fresh. His captors have been busy. He looks in the mirror, seeing that "cleaning up" is probably the one task that will prolong his life longer than anything. It's 6:13:24.