Episode Report Card M. Giant: B | Grade It Now! YOU GRADE IT Down with the Sickness
By M. Giant | Season 7 | Episode 17 | Aired on 04.06.2009
At 12:09:34, Tony's making his way to an open gate when Doug calls out to him. "Doug Knowles. Jack Bauer sent me," he says. The two of them duck behind a corner, just as a Starkwood Humvee with a searchlight prowls past. Doug offers to take Tony to a restricted area on the east perimeter, although he's not sure how they'll make it with so many guards wandering around. Why doesn't he teleport over, like he just teleported from his office to meet Tony? But Tony says he'll take care of the guards.
Except he's going to need satellite coverage on that area of the compound, and when he calls back to Kiefer to set it up, Kiefer is shaking and twitching, unable to answer. "Jack? Renee? Anybody?" Tony frets. Seriously, can't anybody at the whole FBI help a brother out without Kiefer giving the okay? He doesn't even work there, for God's sake. Walker finally answers, and puts Janis to work on the satellite coverage. Then she looks behind her and sees Kiefer leaning weakly against a support column. Janis tells Tony the coast is clear for now, and he and Doug move out. Walker asks Kiefer if he's okay, and when he pants that he's fine, she says they need to update the White House. Kiefer asks for a minute to pull himself together. Lucky for him, we're up to our first commercial break. It's 12:10:52.
At 12:15:13, Tim from Homeland enters the Oval Office, where Taylor's just standing around with Olivia, apparently doing nothing. "Excuse the interruption," he says. Good one. He says Kiefer's on line seven. Taylor picks up the call and says, "Mr. Bauer, tell me you have the bioweapon." Well, not unless the part of it currently in Kiefer's bloodstream counts. Calling from FBI's conference room with Walker, he has to admit that "Agent Moss and his men were forced to withdraw from a firefight they most certainly would have lost." Taylor is pretty pissed that Hodges threatened to shoot at federal agents. "My God, who does he think he is?" Oh, don't worry, we'll be getting into that at some length this hour. Kiefer doesn't have an answer for her, but he tells her about the plan with Doug and Tony that's already underway. Tim chimes in that according to SecDef, troops are still several hours away. "At which point we have a war on our hands against 1500 mercenaries armed with bioweapons," Taylor says. Oh, just call everyone back from Sangala, now that that whole situation is under control. And speaking of which, I still don't get why General Juma launched a suicide mission to the White House instead of holding onto some of those bioweapons himself and using them against the American invaders in Sangala. But of course he's dead, so we can't ask him, which is how so much gets explained on this show, even this season. Anyway, Kiefer tells Taylor that a surgical air strike will work, if they can find the weapons' exact location on the Starkwood compound. Taylor wants Kiefer to visually confirm the existence of the canisters, since he's the only one who's seen them. "No more mistakes." Speaking of which, Olivia's phone is suddenly buzzing, and she exits the room to pick it up. Kiefer asks Taylor if there's anything else, and she picks up the handset, which means it's about to get personal. She says she's heard about Kiefer's exposure. "How you doin'?" Kiefer says he's fine right now, thanks for asking, and she says, "Thank you for your service. I'm not giving up on you." Oh, Taylor, the last thing he needs right now is for you to make him cry. Kiefer hangs up before that can happen, and he and Walker leave the conference room.