Day 2: 1:00 PM -- 2:00 PM

Previouslies. Nina is back, and there's this bomb about to go off unless Jack can stop it. And some other stuff has happened too.

Okay, so I just got back from Vegas -- where I autographed posters for Agent0042 and Mrs. Dalgliesh; thanks guys! -- and discovered that my tape is missing a few minutes from the top of the show. Apparently my technophobic ex-boyfriend, who was taking care of my dogs and doesn't have cable, taped an episode of South Park over it. Thanks for taking care of my dogs and otherwise being a very agreeable ex, Mario, but that rule about not touching the VCR from while we were going out? It still applies. So anyway, according to the official recap on the Fox site, the show opens thusly: "As Nina waits in a secured CTU room, Jack is handed her case file. Yet he knows all about her and doesn't need it to interrogate her." I didn't see it myself, but I'm sure it was fraught with sexual tension.

So then I still don't have the beginning of this scene at NSA but from what I can gather from the Fox site, reporters are bombarding Palmer with questions about the helicopter crash and if it has any connection to the CTU bombing. Palmer remains silent about the B-O-M-B and promises a "full investigation." Asian Patty is left holding the bag and assures the reporters that a statement will be released once they know more. As Palmer and Rolaide walk away from the press conference, Palmer reminds Rolaide to curtail any further statements to the press and keep leaks to a minimum.

Oh, man. Someone as gay as I am is doing the cinematography for this episode, because the opening shot of this scene is a total shout-out to one of those Vogue photographs from the sixties taken by someone like Avedon or Bert Stern. A woman is sitting in Palmer's office, but all we can see of her is the back of her head and one of her perfectly made-up eyes in the mirror of her compact. Palmer enters; the mystery lady turns around and reveals herself. It's Lady Mac! Rock out! Oh sure, there's no way on earth that the Secret Service would just let Palmer's ex-wife into his office to hang out unsupervised, but she's bringing the Heather Locklear on Melrose Place vibe, so I'm not complaining too hard. Palmer asks her how she got in his office. Lady Mac elliptically replies that "many people" respect the fact that she was married to Palmer for "many years." That's kind of like saying that many people respected the fact that Ike was married to Tina for many years and then giving Ike the keys to Tina's dressing room, but, again, I'm not going to complain. We've missed Lady Mac, and we're not going to ask too many questions. At the mention of "marriage," Rolaide looks down guiltily at her shoes, giving us something to ruminate on. Lady Mac says that she needs to talk to Palmer alone for five minutes, and looks pointedly at Rolaide. Palmer tells her that even if he was interested in what she has to say, today is not the day. Lady Mac assures him that it's not about their marriage. "Did you order an evacuation of military personnel out of Los Angeles?" she asks. Palmer and Rolaide are both stunned to hear this, since Palmer ordered no such evacuation. "Who told you this?" asks Palmer calmly after one of his trademark slow burns. "Five minutes," purrs Lady Mac, holding up five of her manicured fingers. Palmer tells her to wait, pulls Rolaide aside, and asks her to find out more about the evacuation.

Chez Crew. Soul Patch continues to question FarsiBoy about his ties to Syed Ali. FarsiBoy refuses to answer, instead accusing Soul Patch of engaging in racial profiling. He also points out that he's from England and is about to marry a white Protestant American girl, so Soul Patch doesn't even have his facts straight. Soul Patch points out that educated Muslims with passports and the ability to assimilate into Western society are precisely the sorts of people that are recruited by terrorist cells. In fact, one of the places that recruits a large number of these terrorists is a mosque locatednear Reza's home in London. "So tell me, Reza," says Soul Patch, his moist mouth opening provocatively. "How's my racial profiling going now?" Reza asks for a lawyer. Soul Patch flatly refuses his request.

Back at NSA, Palmer, Rolaide, and Yulin have an impromptu meeting while traversing the halls of NSA in a series of golf carts and elevators. Palmer doesn't think the helicopter crash was an accident. Yulin and Rolaide agree with that theory. Yulin feels that the Fauxraqi government is behind the crash, since they might have been upset that the ambassador was trading intelligence with the U.S. Palmer and Rolaide feel that someone in the U.S. government might be behind it, upset that they were trading intelligence with Fauxraqistan. After all, if Rolaide and Yulin were against Palmer's decision to trade, someone else could be as well. Palmer tells Rolaide to set up an independent investigation to get to the bottom of everything. Yulin looks semi-busted.

CTU. Everything is in place for the Kiefer-on-Nina interrogation to begin. I'll bet you they at least considered showing the uncut version in Pay-Per-View format. Kiefer assures Mason that he'll get all of the important information out of Nina. Mason reminds Kiefer that the last time he let Kiefer interrogate someone, he "shot him in the chest." Kiefer promises to be a good boy. Mason wishes him luck and glances down at Kiefer's package. Kiefer enters the interrogation room and puts the presidential pardon down on the Modotti table in front of Nina. They exchange looks fraught with tension -- the kind of meaningful glances that could really only be shared between two people who once worked together, had some hot sex, then worked together some more until one of them killed the other one's wife while betraying her country. You know how that happens. Finally, Nina speaks. She explains that she needs to be "on a plane to Visalia." Um, what is Visalia? Is it a new fictional country? Is it a skanky neighborhood in Manhattan that realtors are trying to class up by renaming it "Visalia"? Is it an Eastern Bloc-themed hotel and casino in Vegas? A search through the Fox site turns up nothing. Kiefer asks her why she needs to be in Visalia. Nina says she has a contact there who's the only person who can tell her where the bomb is. She refuses to disclose her contact's name to Kiefer. Kiefer doesn't want to play along. He threatens to hold onto her until the bomb goes off in L.A. Nina tries to reason with him, saying that she's not trying to play Kiefer, since she only gets the pardon if she stops the bomb. Kiefer goes krazy. He throws the Modotti table against the wall and screams at her to stop wasting his time and give him the name. With the table no longer separating them, their faces are inches apart. Nina threatens to have Kiefer removed from the case if he "touches her."

Meanwhile, Mason and Bitchelle are watching the interrogation on the closed circuit video monitor outside. Bitchelle looks really embarrassed by having seen all that. Mason is probably masturbating. Kiefer is momentarily subdued by Nina's threat. "You're just going to have to follow my lead," says Nina smugly. Kiefer attacks her again, but this time he grabs her by the neck and forces her up against the wall. He whips out the patented Sutherland bedroom whisper and threatens to kill her painfully unless she tells him everything. "No one will stop me!" he says. It's true. No one would stop him. They'd all be watching, or trying to find a video camera and tissues. Then Mason, who sees this on the monitor, rushes to the interrogation room to break it up, but he can't enter the room itself. He tells Kiefer to kut it out. Kiefer releases Nina and leaves the room. She doesn't look so smug now. Mason tells Kiefer that he's off the kase. Kiefer kounters that he's got her right where he wants her. If Nina thinks she's in kontrol, she won't kooperate. She needs to believe that Kiefer will break the rules to get what he wants. Mason reluctantly agrees to this strategy and lets him back into the room. "All I need is five minutes," says Kiefer. So that's why Julia Roberts ran off with Jason Patric to Ireland on the day of your wedding. He also gets Mason to raise the thermostat by ten degrees. The time is 01:14:28 PM.

The time is 01:17:52 PM. Klockwise from the top left, Palmer consults with governmental-looking people, caterers and movers enter Chez Crew to set up for the wedding, and Nina waits for Kiefer's explosion. At Chez Crew, PoorMan'sCateBlanchett enters PoorMan'sReneeZellweger's bedroom. Renee has changed from her wedding dress into a crisp white men's oxford cloth shirt that brings out the, um, whiteness in her skin. "We need to talk," says Cate. Renee is all, "I told you to leave." Cate sits down on Renee's Ethan Allen sleigh bed to the teddy bears and damask throw pillows and tells Renee that she can still be as mad at Cate as she wants. But they still need to do something about the wedding, since it probably won't happen as scheduled what with Reza being detained by CTU and all. Renee accuses Cate of enjoying the wedding cancellation. Cate insists that she's just trying to helpthe way she always has since their mom died and Cate had to drop out of school to help take care of Renee. Renee accuses Cate of putting her own life on hold for Renee and then resenting Renee when she no longer needed her. "Mom died a long time ago," says Renee. "So get your own life and stay out of mine! I'm not canceling this wedding!" She then locks herself in her bathroompresumably to purge that Junior Mint she ate ten minutes ago or to apply some more 89 SPF sunscreen.

St. Virgil's. Hush little baby, don't say a word. Papa's gonna sing creepy Mother Goose songs to you while he prepares to evade the police. JonBenet is dressed and ready to go. DaddyStopTouchingMe whips out a pen knife, cuts off her hospital wrist tag, and stresses the importance of not talking to anyone who tries to stop them from leaving the hospital. A sassy black nurse with closely cropped natural hair enters, looks suspiciously past DaddyStopTouchingMe at JonBenet in her street clothes, and informs DSTM that he has a phone call. DSTM is all, "Why can't I take it in here?" SassyBlackNurse is all, "Because we don't have phones in the room unless you specifically order one." Oh, you do not want to piss off SassyBlackNurse. She is not a just cultural stereotype, or the source of witty one-liners or relationship advice. She is a cultural reality. There is one of these ladies working the floor of every single hospital of every single major city in the U.S. and she does not miss a trick. She will take your shit past a certain point because she is a professional, but once you cross the line you will feel her wrath. If you piss her off enough, she will calmly type your name into a database, and every single Sassy Black Working Woman from here to Elko, Nevada will be up your ass: Sassy Black Waitresses, Sassy Black Hotel Maids, Sassy Black Receptionists will unite to make your life a living hell, and you will never get a second cup of coffee, fresh towels, or a phone message again as long as you live. And don't even get me started on what the gay Mafia will do to you.

DSTM follows SassyBlackNurse to the phone, but warns JonBenet not to move until he comes back. He takes the call, and it turns out to be En-Rick-Ay, pretending to be an accounts payable administrator with a problem with DSTM's bill. While DaddyStopPissingOffSassyBlackNurse is distracted sufficiently, Spawn enters JonBenet's room and convinces her to leave with Spawn. Meanwhile, DSTM gets frustrated by the "ineptitude" of the accounts receivable department and hangs up on them, promising to drop by their offices "later." He goes back to fetch Jon Benet, and she's gone. He takes it up with SassyBlackNurse, who tells him to try looking for her in the bathroom. She's not in the bathroom, so SBN suggests that they might have taken her to radiology. "Find out where she is," barks DaddyStopTouchingMe. SBN stomps off to do just thatas soon as she enters DaddyStopTouchingMe into the aforementioned database. He punches the wall. The time is 01:28:26 PM.

The time is 01:32:40 PM. Klockwise from the top left, PoorMan'sCateBlanchett paces the floors of Chez Crew, hospital workers wheel stuff around St. Virgil's, and Kiefer prepares to question Nina some more. At St. Virgil's, Spawn and JonBenet run into En-Rick-Ay in a stairwell and they make their way out of there. JonBenet starts to freak out about the fact that she's broken a promise to her daddy by leaving with Spawn and her boyfriend. Spawn begs JonBenet to trust them. "Your daddy is going to keep hurting you unless you leave with us right now." Um, actually, Spawn, DaddyStopTouchingMe will most likely have to stop hurting his daughter once they are both vaporized in the nuclear blast. I'm just bringing some reality into it, 'kay? Meanwhile, DaddyStopTouchingMe is going off some more on SassyBlackNurse. He tells her to call security and freaks out some more. Back in the stairwell, Spawn has finally convinced JonBenet to stop crying and come with them. They are just about to find their way out when they encounter a security guard who seems to be looking for them. They hide in an examination room.