Episode Report Card M. Giant: A- | 0 USERS: N/A YOU GRADE IT Manning Down
By M. Giant | Season 6 | Episode 4 | Aired on 2007.01.15
Curtis comes and finds Kiefer. Before Curtis can say anything, Kiefer says that he's been put in charge, and that he needs Curtis to get over whatever crawled up his ass and died regarding Assad, because they need Assad's help. Curtis is incredulous: "Time was, you would have seen through this guy in a minute. What'd the Chinese do to you?" Kiefer turns and gets right up in Curtis's sternum, demanding, "Is there something you need to tell me?...Is there some kind of history between you and Assad?" Before Curtis can answer -- if he even cares to -- Assad himself appears, addressing Kiefer by his first name and holding up a valuable find from the wreckage. It's a PDA that got half-blown up, but fortunately, the impact froze the liquid-crystal display somehow, and the message on the screen is still readable. "Visitor arrived on Thursday," it says. Assad explains that "visitor" is a code name that means "weapon." The two of them conclude that the message means Fayed got his suitcase nuke on Thursday, but that he still needs Numair to make it work. As Assad is led back to the CTUmobiles, Kiefer tells Curtis that nothing's more important than finding Fayed and Numair. Curtis grudgingly agrees, and goes to rejoin the other agents. But Kiefer hangs back so that he can call Chloe at CTU and have her run some kind of cross-reference search on Curtis and Assad. Basically, he wants to know when exactly Assad pissed in Curtis's Wheaties, and in what volume. Because she's got other shit going on, Chloe wonders how important this really is, but of course Kiefer wouldn't be asking if it weren't. We'll be finding out exactly how important later.
Numair arrives at Fayed's hideout. Fayed embraces his accomplice and says that he was beginning to worry. "The escape went as planned, but I had to be careful crossing the city," Numair explains. Wow, so careful that "crossing the city" took him almost nine whole minutes. Even accounting for the fact that Numair found time to locate and change into civilian clothes, no wonder Fayed was concerned. At 9:09:16, Numair is led across the warehouse floor and presented with a large silver briefcase. He opens it, revealing what looks like a large silver Thermos inside. Numair recognizes it immediately. There's a problem, though, and it's not the fact that Numair knows suitcase nukes and not briefcase nukes; it's that he's missing the component he needs to reprogram the trigger. Fayed says that a courier will be bringing it soon. "A recent recruit, but reliable," he assures Numair.