Escape From L.A.

S03E06

So, I was discussing this show with a friend of mine, and his take is that he had to stop watching 24 because the title reminded him too much of exactly how many hours of his life he was giving up so that he could watch it. All I could counter with was, "Kiefer Sutherland lights my pants on fire." Checkmate.

24. Blip blip blip boom. In the last hour of Incredibly Stressful Shenanigans, Day III: This Time, It's Way More Personal Than It Was The Last Two Times, the debate between President Palmer and Ruby Keeler began; the latter whipped out the accusation that Dr. Anne had faked drug-test results in a clinical trial. Keeler wonders if Palmer knew this and has been covering up the whole thing. Bitchelle tells Spawn that Kiefer broke Felipe Hartmano out of prison, and Spawn has to admit that she's the brainless assnut who issued the transfer order that started it. Bitchelle figures that if they can find Kontagious Kyle, Kief will kough up Hartmano. Meanwhile, the aforementioned V-I-R-U-S Singcubator decided to hang himself, but because everything he tries to do for the greater good ends up muddled and wrong, his girlfriend saves him. Then CTU rescues them. PoorMan'sJennieGarth is highly agitated and lamenting that being PMJG means she lacks the money to get decent highlights. In a standoff with the cops and Special Agent Charlie Brown, Kiefer insisted that they let him escape with Hartmano, or else there will be a lot of fucked people out there. Charlie relents, Kiefer hijacks a helicopter, and they float away. Hartmano chortles for our edification that Kiefer is now a bigger enemy to his kountry than Hartmano himself is. Wow, that was long. I thought this show was in real time. Unless I'm living in a vacuum and I don't realize that real people stop every hour and recap for themselves what happened in the sixty minutes, and what it might mean, and when during the hour their five bathroom breaks might be.

The following takes place between 6:00 PM and 7:00 PM...during the summer sometime, because it's still really light outside. Up in the KieferKopter, our hero is furrowing his brow as Hartmano asks if they have enough fuel to get to Mexico. Kiefer says they're not going to Mexico, because that's just where they'd expect them to go, so they'd just get kaptured. Hartmano doesn't know what to think. "Trust me," Kiefer says. Hartmano's like, well, I've got no other fucking options.

Potato Face is sitting at her desk doing fugly things with her lips when Special Agent Charlie Brown calls asking for a radar tracking of the KieferKopter. Potato sends him the information as Spawn watches from across the room, unsure when to register a facial expression. "He's heading west toward downtown," Potato Face monotones. Charlie deduces that Kief's kunning plan is to get the kopter over a populated area so that it can't be shot down. Charlie lets a bead of sweat squeak out of one of his pores so that we know all these attempts to outthink Kiefer are strenuous. Charlie asks Potato Face to hijack an emergency frequency so that he can get a message to Kiefer via the radio. "On it," Potato Face says.

Some guy named Major Blanchard is talking to Ryan Chappelle, our rat-faced enemy from Day 2 who likes to sweep in and take control right when it's most dire for Kiefer. It's like he's got KiefKrisis radar stitched into his clip-on tie. Major Blowhard intones that they have ten minutes before they catch Kiefer. Chappelle weasels that they should shoot down the helicopter if necessary, but before it gets over the city, at which point it would risk dropping fatal debris or its flaming carcass upon civilians and reviled doctors alike. Spawn and Bitchelle both eavesdrop as Chappelle hangs up and smarms to Bitchelle that he's taking over while Soul Patch is in the hospital. She frowns, then vomits out some more exposition so that we're absolutely clear where things stand: They need to reach the chopper to tell Kiefer that they've got Kontagious Kyle in custody, because once he knows that, he'll dump Hartmano like the prison bitch he is. Chappelle calls a meeting to make sure everyone's on the same page, pushing the envelope outside the box, and other clichés for the power-hungry executive. As he walks away, Bitchelle frowns a bit more so that we're clear she isn't wild about Chappelle being brought into the situation so that, like always, he can make inconvenient decisions that thwart the good guys. She's a little sick of the sameness of it. She's not wrong.

Potato Face, who can't do anything with ease or speed, is still trying to hook onto an emergency frequency so Special Agent Charlie Brown can talk to the KieferKopter. Bitchelle orders Adam The Woman Hater to round up the appropriate people and hit the conference room. She then gives Spawn an assignment I don't understand that will allegedly help Potato Face. "I'm on it," Spawn says. Is that the only thing anyone on this show says when they get orders? So far it's been done twice. Whatever happened to "Sure," "Aye aye," or "Fuck yeah, bitch, I'm'a rip up that shit with a quickness"? All equally effective.

Quietly, Potato Face apologizes for being snippy to Spawn, even though it's the only likable thing she's done all season -- uh, "day." Spawn doesn't much care and just wants to know if Kief's getting busted for the drugs. She doesn't seem too concerned about the fact of the smack, just that Kiefer might get in trouble before he teaches her to tie a good tourniquet. Potato Face confirms without concern that she turned in the drugs, but says the shit hit the fan before anyone really could process the information. God, she's horrible. This actress has been funny and great in other things, but she's so miscast on this show. Every time I see her potato face I want to shove it in a deep-fryer.

At the meeting, Chappelle announces that if they can't get word to Kiefer about Kontagious Kyle, they'll have to go after Kiefer and Hartmano with guns blazing. "[They are] expendable," he says. Bitchelle wants to know why they're not pursuing more options that don't involve killing off their renegade rogue agent whose unconventional methods always result in good triumphing over evil. She can't figure out why Chappelle doesn't see the flaw in this idea. Chappelle says that Kiefer's tied their hands with his little suicide mission -- he'll either die at the hands of Hartmano or alongside Hartmano at the hands of CTU, so Chappelle might as well get his jollies by engulfing Kiefer in a flame that's symbolic of the effect he has on our loins. Crystal Gael listens to this with face-twitchy interest. I'm not sure why nobody's been suspicious of him yet -- anyone with that much car grease in his hair is automatically evil. Chappelle repeats yet again what we already know: it's a problem if Kiefer gets the kopter over the downtown kore of Los Angeles, and if anyone knows of a reliable but painless way to evict the family of reindeer that's taken up residence in his anal canal, he'd love to hear it.

Rancho Narcotico. Hector is all agitated because Crystal Gael isn't answering the phone. He handles this by throwing his phone across the room, which won't be phenomenally helpful when he decides to dial again, but who am I to encourage a mustachioed nut job to reconsider his tantrums. PoorMan'sAngelinaJolie massages his shoulders and soothes him, saying maybe Gael's just busy, or, hopefully, in the shower. Hector wants to know what's going on with Hartmano. "The government is probably releasing him," Angelina says listlessly, walking to the window so that her facial expressions can be more suspicious and private. Hector gulps and decides to tell Angelina the truth and risk her irritation, ostensibly because his testicles are tired of living like little intestinal raisins and want to drop back where they belong. "They're not releasing him," Hector admits. "The plan has changed. Kiefer is delivering Ramon." Angelina's breasts quiver and her eyes dart sideways, which she can do since she had the foresight to go stare out the window. "Kiefer?" she gulps. I totally think she either had an affair with him, or she's an undercover officer herself. Well, no "or" there, I guess -- either way, she's probably had some Kiefer kock. "What is that, a joke?" Angelina spits, facing Hector. "How is that possible?" Hector shrugs that Hartmano is indeed accepting Kiefer's help, and Angelina gets angry that they're letting Kiefer kome to them. "That's too dangerous," she spits. "Look what he's already done to us!" She's worried it's a trick. "Don't worry about Kiefer," Hector smiles. "I have plans for him." Angelina's mouth hangs open, which probably corresponds neatly with her plans for Kiefer.

Gael calls Hector just long enough to give us YET ANOTHER reminder that there's a helicopter and a Kiefer and a Hartmano and they're being chased and blah blah blah, we know, and can the network PLEASE stop giving them notes that the show is too hard for new viewers to understand? Gael tries to get our interest back by declaring that everything is going to happen in the few minutes. Hector hangs up and Angelina stares outside, lips twitching from collagen withdrawal.

Spawn asks Adam The Woman Hater what Chappelle said in the meeting. He's all, none of your business, Crap Underling. Actually, Adam WTH says, "He said a lot of things," which is almost as satisfying a brush-off. Spawn is troubled that she can't stick her especially enormous nose into this business. "Are they shooting down my father?" Spawn demands. Spawn? Go home. "If they have to, yeah," Adam WTH says. "But if they can contact him first, it won't come to that." Potato Face, figuring it's been a long time since anyone's logged her general incompetence, pipes up for the official record that she's still not making progress getting a signal, and that it's a wonder she's still employed. "We've got to get through," Adam WTH says pointlessly. Then maybe someone else should be working on it.

Bitchelle summons Spawn and tells her to go home until after they've blown up her father. "I'm qualified to handle the work, Bitchelle," Spawn sniffs. Since when? Since she got her two-year degree before getting a high-level CTU job out of nepotism and bad plotting? The Spawn of old wouldn't know a computer, or qualifications, or what "nepotism" means, if someone ground them up into bullet form and put them in a gun that was pointed at her. Bitchelle points out that her qualifications are not at issue -- which they totally should be -- but rather they're worried that she's a bit too close to the subject. "I can control my emotions," Spawn says, too stupid to point out that Bitchelle's reasoning is flawed when you consider that she chose to work through her husband's surgery. And then, we're treated to one more fucking recap, because by now, we still might not be completely sure that Kiefer has Hartmano, or that Kontagious Kyle is in quarantine, and that this information might stop Kiefer from escaping with Hartmano, and STOP DUMBING DOWN THE SHOW. Bitchelle points out to Spawn that there's a real chance they won't reach Kiefer. "Potato Face and Adam The Woman Hater are getting there, and I can help them," Spawn lies. Uh-huh. Like she helped abet the prison break without notifying a superior. Bitchelle lets her stay anyway. Chappelle emerges from a dark corner and hisses that if they end up firing on Kiefer, he wants Spawn gone. I wish he'd go ahead and fire her -- that would get her out of the building.

KieferKopter. Our hero notices military copters flying in formation on the radar and correctly determines that they're going to try shooting them out of the sky. Hartmano's like, hmm, interesting wrinkle, good thing Kiefer's a human iron. Kiefer grunts.

Special Agent Charlie Brown screeches through L.A. in his Ford You Can't Get One This Tricked Out So Don't Worry About What Product-Placed Model This Is. He calls Chappelle in a snit, pissed that Chappelle authorized the choppers to use force against Kiefer. "Does President Palmer know about this?" he says. Chappelle's like, oh, God, that guy again? Charlie decides that we need to be reminded that Kiefer only turned renegade to prevent the virus from being released. Chappelle doesn't give a fuck -- this is his chance to waste Kiefer, and he's probably a bit stoked. "This is my jurisdiction," he says smoothly. Charlie bitchily points out that getting Palmer's authorization might be smart, considering his long love affair with Kiefer. "Our mandate is not to accommodate personal relationships," Chappelle says. Charlie gets in a right tizzy and is all, well, fine, YOU tell the President that you blew up the love of his life. Charlie has nads bigger than you ever thought Charles Schultz could draw. Although, for once, little Charlie Brown didn't miss this kick -- Chappelle hangs up properly chagrined and orders Major Blowhard not to fire on Kiefer just yet.

Ruby Keeler starts attacking President Palmer's alleged lack of support for the American worker, and does what all politicians do when they want people to think they care: Drops names of "real Americans" who will then mistakenly think that someone genuinely wants to help them rather than just using them for votes. Dr. Anne listens backstage with Brother Palmer, whose mobile rings. It's Chappelle, filling him on in the Kontagious Kyle situation. BroPalm's relieved that they got him. "We still have the Kiefer situation to deal with," Chappelle says. We sit through another damn recap of what's happening, and BroPalm automatically is like, crap, if you kill Kiefer, Palmer's going to put his shit down, flip it, and reverse it. "He's in the middle of a debate -- it'll have to wait," he says. Chappelle points out that it's a tad more immediate than that, because if the chopper lands, Kiefer and Hartmano will disappear into the population. BroPalm hangs up. Dr. Anne frowns.

Keeler goes for Presidential Debate Mainstay #32: Cast aspersions on the president's staff of experts. Indeed, make sure everyone begins air-quoting the word "experts." He's accusing their numbers of being "blurry," but we don't really care because suddenly Brother Palmer comes on over Palmer's earpiece. In split-screen we get Palmer's impassive face and BroPalm's lips speaking into a microphone. He's all, word up, bloods, Kiefer and Hartmano are still out there on the run, and we may need to waste their brash asses before they get home. Can you dig it? Palmer stiffens. Keeler challenges him to respond to whatever mindless prattle just got spewed. "David, what do you want to do?" BroPalm urges. Palmer stares out into the sea of lights and realizes he can't let his loins stir for Kiefer while he's onstage. "My fellow Americans, I've just been informed of an impending national emergency. Therefore, I must withdraw from this debate," Palmer says, exiting swiftly. Ruby Keeler's like, what? I bought new tap shoes and tights just for this, and I haven't even gotten my pants off yet. BroPalm pissily clears the backstage area in a right snit. At 06:14:00, we smash to black praying that the act won't spend half its time recapping what happened in the first one.

The time is 06:18:26, and Kiefer's still flying the unfriendly skies while Spawn pouts and Special Agent Charlie Brown drives. Kontagious Kyle is zipped up in a clear plastic bubble, writhing and screaming and begging to know where he's being taken. To a Jewel concert, Kyle -- what do you think, boy? No one talks to him, so he continues to shit a small suburb of brick townhomes, because if he had to choose between Jewel and death, he'd choose death. Kyle is sent through a decontamination chamber and taken to a place where Dr. Nicole "Andrea Thompson" Duncan can talk to him through her hazmat suit. Andrea tries to calm him down. Kyle asks where PoorMan'sJennieGarth is, and is informed that she's with Hilary Duff trying to get a sibling-hijinks sitcom greenlit on UPN. "There's an incubation period of fourteen hours," Andrea tells him. "With this V-I-R-U-S, if you haven't become symptomatic, you haven't transmitted it." Kyle asks how his parents are, and Andrea promises they're on their way. He turns away, gulps, and milks his moment in the emotional sunlight. "What happens when I do become…symptomatic?" he chokes. "Will it eat me alive?" Andrea blinks, "You're fucked, son, you're fucked," in Morse code. She sidesteps the question by vowing to keep him as comfortable as he can be. Kontagious Kyle sniffles sadly at his fate.

Up in the KieferKopter, no one can figure out why the military choppers haven't shot them yet. Special Agent Charlie Brown badgers Potato Face about why she hasn't found communications frequency they can hijack. "I can't make the servers go any faster, okay?" she somehow manages to whine in a monotone.

Major Blowhard badgers Chappelle for an answer about whether they can pop a kap in KieferKopter's ass. They only have four minutes before they can't safely shoot. That's four real-time minutes. Four.

A newscaster calls into question whether there really is a national emergency, or whether it was a ruse Palmer used to get out of the debate. Palmer gobbles a bunch of pills as Brother Palmer boots everyone out of the room. "I'm sorry, but we don't have a lot of time," he says. "I can't give the order to kill Kiefer," Palmer says. "You can't let Hartmano go, either," BroPalm points out. Palmer is truly torn, but he points out that he thinks Wayne's more worried that if Kiefer lives, he'll somehow blab that Palmer knew he was going to break Hartmano out of prison. "I am worried about that," BroPalm says. He reminds us that Hartmano is eeeeeeevil, with baaaaaaaad connections and the capability of unleashing a V-I-R-U-S. Palmer is like, but Kief's sacrificed everything to make this happen; BroPalm more or less counters that Kief's got a martyr complex and that's nice for him, but it doesn't really outweigh how eeeeeeeevil Hartmano is. "Make the decision as if it wasn't Kiefer on that helicopter," BroPalm urges. "Do what's right for this country." As the time pressure is once again asserted, Palmer faces life without repressed man-love, and has to admit that it might make his pants fit a bit looser in the crotch. "Get me Chappelle," he says.

Major Blowhard announces that there's one minute left. Chappelle's phone rings; it's Palmer, wanting to know why they can't get the chopper down without incinerating Kiefer's sinewy bod. "Kiefer won't communicate with us. He's forcing our hand," Chappelle says. Palmer fondly recalls the last time Kiefer forced his hand -- that afternoon in Acapulco, the Mai Tais, the sauna -- and sadly asks how much time they have so that he can think for another minute about how to explain this to feisty David Jr. "In sixty seconds he'll be out of reach," Chappelle says. Palmer swallows hard, silently thanks Kief for the memories, and gives the authorization to fire. "Major, shoot him down," Chappelle says immediately.

Just as Blowhard gives the order, though, Kiefer drops the kopter closer to the buildings. Basically, he's outwitted the enemy. They scramble to get a shot before it's too late, but alas, they can't, because the show isn't ballsy enough to kill Kiefer. "He's reached the downtown core," one of the pilots says.

Chappelle trots out into CTU's main room and announces that they're falling back to Plan B, so all ground units should prepare to swarm Kiefer. "I want to be on top of him," he announces. Get in line. Spawn chomps on one of her fingernails. Eat a sandwich instead, Spawn. You need to gain weight so your schnozz no longer dominates the rest of you. Special Agent Charlie Brown gets up in Potato Face's grill about not having isolated a frequency, but she's close; meanwhile, the KieferKopter touches down in the middle of a busy street and kauses kars to kreatively swerve. "Any second now, Charlie," Potato Face insists. "I need to get to him before he lands!" Charlie panics. Too late: Potato Face gets the signal and Charlie delivers the message, but as it comes through the radio, we see that Kiefer and Hartmano have exited the chopper and fled into a subway station as amused extras watch. We smash to black at 06:26:09 figuring they'll be pretty pissed when the train dumps them out in the Valley somewhere and they realize that they're…in the Valley.

At 06:30:33, Bitchelle watches the feed of Tony's operation, and Kontagious Kyle's parents show up to watch the V-I-R-U-S stand up and giggle, "Your son: It's what's for dinner." Andrea explains that their options are very limited. Her voice sounds like she's swallowed three cartons of cigarettes. Papa Kyle is a little confused by all this, so Andrea explains that if Kyle's got the V-I-R-U-S, they can't cure him, so they just have to wait and see what happens. Papa Kyle wants to know how long it'll take to kill Kyle. "Hours, not days," Andrea apologizes. Mama Kyle is stricken. Kyle stares at them from inside his chamber of doom. Papa Kyle wants to see him, and Mama Kyle has the regularly scheduled moment of "no, I can't do it, aaaah," because if she doesn't do that, Papa Kyle can't grab her and say something trite like, "He has to know we're not angry with him," and if he doesn't say that, she won't nod grudgingly and stagger over to the wall so she can say goodbye to her very stupid child. As it happens, these things do all fall into place, and Andrea escorts them to the intercom.

Kyle gets off his bed and stumbles toward the clear wall. "Baby…" Mama Kyle says. Papa Kyle sadly tells his son that the doctor told them everything, and Mama Kyle gets all twittery and decides maybe it's not as bad as the doctors think. "They're not wrong," Kyle sniffles. "I deserve what I'm getting." Papa Kyle busts out the entirely overused "you deserved a better father" line, and then follows up with the hackneyed "if I'd provided for my family you wouldn't have tried to sell drugs/turned to prostitution/sold your organs" approach. He's tearing up at the sheer heft of his addiction to clichés. Kyle, though, drank some Trite Juice this morning, too, so he sobs that he loves his parents and that they make him feel safe, even now. "You did the best you could, Dad," Kyle cries. Mama Kyle seems half-sad, half-scared that the way this scene is going, she's going to be expected to slam herself against the glass and scream, "NOT MY BABY…NOOOO…" before slumping to the ground in a convulsive fit. To head this off, she and Papa Kyle run up to the glass and touch it; Kyle does the same, and they wail a little in unison.

Special Agent Charlie Brown parks his car where the KieferKopter is and stresses out that it's empty. A cop says that witnesses saw them running into the subway, and two trains have since left, both of which are being searched. Charlie knows Kiefer is smarter than that, so ironically, he puts in a call to the dumbest thing Kiefer ever did: Spawn. "CTU Bauer," Spawn says. No, she's not flaunting her name at ALL. Charlie asks her for the schematics of the Pershing Square subway station. "What's going on, Charlie?" she asks. None of your business, low-level skank. Just shut up and do your work. Oh, but Charlie doesn't hate her -- yet -- so he gives her a polite answer about Kiefer's escape and explains that they're on the run in the station. Spawn checks the blueprints and says there's a secret exit in an alley off Sixth Street, which of course Kiefer would know without checking, because he's Kiefer. Even his sneezes contain useful information. Spawn tells Charlie it's a block away and he's better off on foot because the streets are one-way nightmares, and he hangs up and takes off sprinting. This of course leads to a shot of him playing Frogger with the traffic, all of which squeals and screeches and spins around him but never hits him.

Spawn tells Bitchelle about Charlie's phone call, and Bitchelle tells her to copy all the other field agents on this information. "I did," Spawn says, all full of self-righteousness and confidence, as if her hair isn't the biggest mistake since Bride skipped a pill. There's an awkward pause where Bitchelle tries to continue working without acknowledging Spawn, who can't handle not being in the know. "They know not to use lethal force, right?" she frets. Bitchelle's shrugs that their mandate hasn't changed. Instead of sending Spawn home for being in no position to think clearly on this issue, Bitchelle instead softens and turns toward Spawn and says, "But now that they're on the ground they can probably [get them] without harming your father." Spawn nods and leaves.

Charlie sprints through town, takes a couple turns, and…wait, didn't Spawn say it was one block? This is a long block. Spawn probably doesn't know how to read a map. At any rate, Charlie reaches the alley and sees a manhole-type thing that's been opened. He calls Bitchelle and tells her that Kiefer is in the 900 block of Mission, so she should seal off a ten-block radius and redeploy everyone. "I'm on it," Bitchelle of course says.

Meanwhile, Kiefer and Felipe Hartmano have gotten to a valet car park that doesn't have an attendant. Kiefer rifles through the keys until he finds something made by the show's sponsor, and promptly unlocks a shiny blue Ford sports car. At 06:37:20, he revs up the KieferKrotchRocket and zooms out of the parking lot.

At 06:14:44, a newscast suggests that the public and the Ruby Keeler campaign think Palmer's abrupt exit from the debate is suspiciously odd. Palmer pouts. Brother Palmer hangs up his phone and shares that CTU hasn't located Kiefer or Hartmano, but the LAPD is trying to seal off the area. "It's probably more likely that he slipped through," Palmer says, a tinge of hope in his tone because he wants Kief to live and love him another day. "David, stop thinking about his welfare for a moment. Kiefer breaking Hartmano out of prison has reached the press," BroPalm snaps. "You have to go out there and explain to them that's why you ended the debate, and then denounce what Kiefer did." Palmer stiffens; he resents that Kiefer put his life on the line and they're responding by screwing him, and not in the sexy way he likes. BroPalm stresses that they need to cover up the fact that Palmer knew what Kiefer was going to do. "I'm sorry, but you're going to have to let him go," BroPalm says. Palmer looks heartbroken.

KieferKrotchRocket. Kiefer kalls the pilot of the Hartmano jet, explaining that these were the contact instructions CTU had. He tells the pilot, Capitano Cocaine, that he's on a secure cell, and gives him a number so he can reconfigure his frequency, or some other hoo-ha to keep things private, and call Kiefer back. Crystal Gael is listening in, and confirms to El Capitano that it's the real deal, and Kiefer does have Hartmano. Gael protects the call from CTU, and Kiefer's phone rings. They arrange to meet at the Santa Margarita airstrip. "I can be there in ten minutes," Kiefer says, hanging up. Hartmano cackles at him. "You really are the best, Kiefer," he chortles. As Kiefer tries not to listen, Hartmano says that even the whole time he was undercover, no one had a clue he might be an agent. "We accepted you. You didn't have to put the needle in your arm -- you did that for other reasons," Hartmano says. Kiefer sweats a bit. "Same reason as all junkies: to kill the pain. What's your pain, Kiefer?" Hartmano presses. "What does the needle make go away?" Kiefer twitches and stares straight ahead, unwilling to answer this for fear that he'll open his mouth and "Spawn, my homoerotic relationship with Palmer, and my martyr complex" will be what comes out of it.

Bitchelle gets a call from the doctor, who says that Soul Patch is out of surgery and should fully recover. She sighs, relieved, closing her eyes and letting uncensored joy flit across her face for a second before regaining her game face. The doctor thinks Tony might wake up in an hour or so. "I'll be there, thank you," Bitchelle breathes. As soon as she hangs up, Chappelle appears. Is he stalking her? She does look rather fetching in her cleavage shirt. "Soul Patch is going to be okay," she says, allowing a small smile. "That's good news," Chappelle says, leaning in and giving Bitchelle the stiffest, coldest hug. It's kind of funny, and Bitchelle looks completely startled by it, especially considering that Soul Patch once locked up and repeatedly drugged Chappelle to buy Kiefer some time. Chappelle switches the conversation back to work; Bitchelle assures him that they sent alerts down into Mexico, but the FAA is being difficult, so they haven't been able to seal off all the local airfields. Chappelle suggests looking at regular air traffic patterns in the area and see if today's show any anomalies. "Good idea," she nods, still a little weirded out by the hug, which cast a strange vibe over the rest of the conversation.

Bitchelle calls Adam to ask where Crystal Gael is. "Tech one. We're headed there," he says. Bitchelle wants them to send Crystal to her. Then she puts down the phone, checks around to make sure no one's watching, and allows herself another happy sigh. Good scene for her.

Crystal is sitting in front of his multiple computer screens, blocking frequencies and spying on the Hartmano jet and playing Dope Wars. Something beeps, so he checks a monitor and sees that Spawn and Adam are headed into the room. "I'll get back to you," he says to Capitano Cocaine, and swiftly tries to hide all the spy windows open on his machine. "Crystal, Bitchelle needs to see you in her office," Adam says as he leads Spawn to a machine. Crystal gets all territorial and snits that he can do whatever Spawn is supposed to be doing, and ten times faster. I know a one-eyed drunk monkey with brain damage who could say the same. "Bitchelle needs to see you now," Adam says pointedly. Crystal looks annoyed and leaves in a surly huff, because he is a horrible mole -- so bad that even Spawn notices something's amiss, and watches him go. You can see her brain struggle to process this, like the hamster finally stopped doing keg stands and is trying to stumble his way onto the wheel and run on it without vomiting. Suddenly she notices a prompt on his machine: "Are you sure you want to quit?" At 06:48:08, we smash to black wondering if Spawn's on the verge of doing something useful, and figuring we shouldn't get our hopes up.

The time is 06:52:32. Spawn's still around, Kontagious Kyle is still weepy, President Palmer is still nursing a broken heart, and Kiefer is still Kiefering his way through danger and potential tragedy. All is as it should be.

Palmer leaves a meeting to steal a moment with Dr. Anne. "Is everything okay?" she worries. Palmer soothingly says that he just had to make a couple fast decisions he couldn't make onstage. "Everything's okay now," he says. "It's just damage control." Dr. Anne wrings her hands and apologizes for the stuff with her ex. "I can't believe Keeler would repeat those lies in a national debate," she frets. Um, hello? Is she new to the world? Palmer insists that they're going to win out because they didn't sink to his level. "I'm more concerned about you," he purrs. She smiles that she's fine. "Yes, you are," he grins, pulling her in for a kiss. Brother Palmer appears to prefer it when Palmer's tongue is inside his own mouth, so he interrupts this moment so that he can have a snit fit. He wants Palmer's response to the Dr. Anne allegations, and says that the quick polls are showing on-the-fence voters as having leapt into Keeler's backyard. Dr. Anne explodes. "That's ridiculous," she rants. "Once they find out Fred is lying…" BroPalm is like, and how do you suggest we achieve that? "This is politics and not medicine, so do me a favor and stay out of it," he snaps. "Stay out of it? I AM IT," she spits. Palmer breaks up the fight and booms that Dr. Anne is there to stay, and so is their strategy of not dignifying this with an answer. I seriously can't believe this is such a catastrophe when you consider all of Lady Mac's shenanigans. Bringing a bomb into the country? Oops! She was just trying to help. Fabricating test results? ROT IN JAIL, YOU FUCKPUNCHING HUSSY. That's sound logic. BroPalm sidles up to Palmer and says, "David, we need to talk about this right now." Palmer levels him with a cool glare. "Right now, it's 'Mr. President,'" he says. Wayne's taken aback. His skin is smoking, so harsh was that burn. He backs away.

Dr. Anne bites her lip and admits that even though Brother Palmer is a prissy asshole, he might have a point. She gently suggests putting their relationship on hold until after the election, at which time she ostensibly thinks the president can get away with dating someone of questionable integrity. She's probably right, too. Palmer hates this idea. "First of all, that won't resolve anything, and second, I need you," he wheedles. She peers up at him, sighs like she's put-upon or something even though he's being pretty understanding here, and says, "Then I'm right here." They hug. "That's my lady," Palmer smiles. Oh Lord. Never attempt sweet nothings, Palmer. It's not you. From afar, BroPalm shoots them a poisonous look.

From Kontagion Central, Kyle sits on his bed, staring at the activity outside his chamber and wishing he was out of there and into the business end of a KFC bucket and a joint. He sees Andrea on the phone. We cut out to where she is, because she's getting Kyle's test results. Dumbfounded, she rifles through them and mutters, "How can that be?" She asks if they rechecked the results. "Three times," says Random Technician. "You're sure?" Andrea presses. "Very sure," Random Technician says, barely concealing her glee at the SAG wages she's going to get for having those two lines. Andrea orders her to get Chappelle on the phone and heads over to Kyle's parents. Then, to Kyle's alarm, she escorts them into Kontagion Central without putting them in protective suits. He's like, what the hell? "There's no trace of the virus in your blood," Andrea says. "You're clean." Kyle's parents are thrilled, and they hug him; Kyle is now learning that you should always make sure you're about to die before you make loving and weepy confessions. He's totally like, "Shit, if I'd known this was going to happen, I'd have shut my damn mouth."

Andrea's cell rings; it's Chappelle, and he's appropriately peeved that Kontagious Kyle is now Klean Kyle. "How is that possible?" he gapes. "It's only possible if he was never infected," Andrea says. Chappelle's irate that the V-I-R-U-S was just a bluff. Andrea points out that the dead body they dropped off was definitely infected, so the V-I-R-U-S is no fake. "Then why not infect the boy? What the hell is going on here?" Chappelle seethes. "You tell me," Andrea grunts. I love that Chappelle's actually pissed that Kyle isn't infected with a flesh-eating bug, as if it would've been so much more convenient if he'd kicked off like he was supposed to do.

KieferKrotchRocket screeches to a halt at the Santa Margarita airfield. Immediately, a bunch of guerrillas show up with machine guns. Kiefer is konfused. He has to be kidding -- there's no way he didn't know this was going to happen. Felipe pulls a gun on him, too, presumably Kiefer's own, or else Kiefer's really stupid and let Hartmano stay armed. I guess he's trying to make it look like he's on Hartmano's side, so maybe that's why he did it. At any rate, Felipe Hartmano rants about how there was no way in hell he was going to let Kiefer get out of this alive. Kiefer gets knocked out, and the guerrillas hold his slumped body up so that Hartmano can press his pistol to Kiefer's neck. "Thanks for the ride, Kiefer," Hartmano cackles. Capitano Cocaine interrupts with the news that Hector wants Kiefer alive. Hartmano is pretty pissed that Hector is cramping his style, but he assents and they board the plane. Hartmano is incredibly short. What he lacks in stature, he makes up for in pure eeeeeeevil.

Spawn works away in the room, but then has the wherewithal to check the monitors and notices that Crystal Gael is busy talking to someone elsewhere. Figuring that this is prime snooping time, Spawn restores the program Crystal Gael didn't properly quit, and sees six video feeds pop up -- one of which is of the Piquante Plane. It's all very suspicious. She's alarmed, and projects the plane feed onto a bigger screen. This room is very Minority Report. Spielberg should get royalties.

The screens split: Hartmano smiles smarmily inside Piquante Plane, an unconscious Kiefer is lying on the floor, and the jet takes off just as newscasters continue talking about Palmer and Dr. Anne. At the drug ranch, PoorMan'sAngelinaJolie continues staring off the balcony into the middle distance, because she looks more like the cover of a smut novel this way. Finally, back at CTU, Spawn advances the footage she's watching and sees the KrotchRocket pull up, and Kiefer get knocked out and dragged onto the plane. She gasps. This is where I'd have been compulsively checking the monitors to locate Crystal Gael, quit the program immediately, and exited the room to give Bitchelle a low-key heads-up to detain Crystal Gael and search his office. But this is Spawn, so she completely forgets she's snooping and just gawks at what she sees. Then Spawn hears someone reenter the room, assumes it's Adam for no good reason, and wails, "Adam, there's something seriously wrong…" And, of course, she comes face to face with Crystal Gael. God, Spawn is dumb. Why wouldn't it enter her head that it might be Crystal entering his own office? Crystal smiles coldly at her and says that he just remembered he forgot to quit his program. Then he pulls a pistol out and points it at Spawn, who is once again trapped by her own uselessness and lack of intellect. I guess at least it took her longer to get herself into trouble -- a full six hours this time -- but the fact remains that she is dumber than a box of hair that's been coughed up by a deranged village idiot.

The time is 06:59:57…58…59…07:00:00. And now back to your regularly scheduled recapper.