I had a dream the other night that I was fleeing from an angry Kiefer. I kept tripping, as one does in dreams, and it turned out I was wearing these huge shoes. They had "PROPERTY OF GUSTAVE" written on them. What do you suppose that's about? In other news (using the term loosely), due to some graphic violence, viewer discretion is advised. And a shout out to MNE for the recap title.
Previously on 24: Bitchelle told Soul Patch over the phone that the poor doomed bastards at Inn Fection shouldn't have to die like Gael did. Soul Patch broke out CTU's supply of suicide capsules, with Chappelle's blessing. Kiefer and Special Agent Charlie Brown got shot at by a helicopter. Kiefer retrieved a hard drive full of juicy Saunders-related info just before MI-6's Los Angeles office blew up around him. Chappelle followed a money trail. Saunders ordered Palmer to have Chappelle killed, or he'd release more of the V-I-R-U-S that's wreaking havoc at Inn Fection. Thank God for those previouslies. This is the first episode I've watched all season and I feel completely up to speed. The following takes place between 6:00 AM and 7:00 AM.
In a conference room, Palmer and Brother Palmer argue about whether Palmer should order Chappelle's death, with Brother Palmer taking the "pro" side. Brother Palmer insists that sacrificing Chappelle is necessary to prevent the deaths of millions of people, many of whom are probably not weasels. Palmer says that in addition to having a moral issue with ordering a man killed, he isn't too keen on letting Saunders hold the country hostage indefinitely. Brother Palmer says that Saunders has proven that he's willing to carry out his threats, and they have to do what he says until they catch him. So we're talking, like, seven hours, max. Don't be such a baby, Palmer.
CTU. Kiefer walks into Chappelle's conference room/remote office setup and they debrief (yay!) each other on what they're doing to find Saunders. Kiefer has the IT lab searching the hard drive he got from MI-6, and Chappelle is still following the money trail. Potato Face comes in looking like she's expecting a smack upside the head and tells Kiefer he's got a call from Palmer, who wants to speak to Kiefer "in private," which in this case apparently means "in the middle of the CTU floor." Kiefer takes the call on some random phone. While Brother Palmer watches from the room, Palmer tells Kiefer about Saunders's demand that Chappelle's body be delivered to "the train yard downtown" by 7:00. Kiefer's confused as to why Saunders has suddenly come over to his side. No, wait -- Kiefer seems to think this is bad news. Instead of capping his boss on the spot and hitting the road like many, many, many people would do in this situation, Kiefer expresses the hope that they can find Saunders before the deadline expires, but Palmer is doubtful. Palmer never exactly says the words "Kiefer, kill Chappelle," but his meaning is clear: he needs Kiefer to handle this one way or the other. They hang up. I'm thinking that Saunders seems like a fellow who would be prepared enough to have people in place to release the V-I-R-U-S even if he does get collared, but perhaps I'm complicating things too much. Kiefer lassos Potato Face as she's shlumping by and tells her to drop what she's doing so she can search for clues to Saunders's whereabouts in the financial records. Potato Face wants to clear it with Chappelle first, but Kiefer nixes that. Potato Face balks: "Chappelle's mad at me for, like, twelve things. I'm not going to add that to the list." Heh. Kiefer busts out the velvet, and Potato Face folds. Obviously he can't tell her that the project he's giving her is necessary to save Chappelle's life, because if he dies that's twelve fewer things that somebody's mad at her about.
Inn Fection. Hazmaticians are herding bloody-faced hotel guests behind a plastic curtain and into an isolation area while Bitchelle's on the phone with Soul Patch. He promises that the suicide capsules will be there soon. I guess that means they're not having Health Services drive them over. Bitchelle tries to bring up her poor chances of appearing in Season Four, but Soul Patch doesn't want to hear it. They have a little moment -- Bitchelle even says "sweetheart" -- and then they disconnect and spend a few seconds struggling not to lose their respective shit. At CTU, Kiefer comes up to Soul Patch and asks whether Bitchelle's test results are back, but we won't know whether she's caught the V-I-R-U-S for another hour -- excuse me, "until week" -- excuse me again, "until Tuesday." I guess it's too much to ask that the test for a deadly virus burn up less than ten percent of a victim's life expectancy.
Kiefer gets to the real reason he wants to talk to Soul Patch: Saunders's order for Chappelle's execution. Soul Patch is also baffled at this development. Kiefer says he doesn't know what he's going to do if he doesn't find Saunders by 7:00. My suggestion is to think back to about twelve hours ago when Chappelle was trying to get Kiefer shot out of the sky, but apparently I lack the forgiving and compassionate nature of Jack Bauer. Soul Patch seems to be more worried about what this means for Kiefer than for Chappelle. He asks whether Kiefer has told Chappelle yet; when Kiefer answers in the negative, Soul Patch says he'll change Chappelle's security clearance first. Kiefer seems surprised that Soul Patch thinks Chappelle might bail, but I think that's because he wasn't around when Soul Patch tried unsuccessfully to stop Mason from leaving the office at the beginning of Season Two. Fool Soul Patch twice, shame on him. Kiefer has Soul Patch put all his people on the search for Saunders, telling him they don't need to know what's going on. I don't know why he wants to keep the threat against Chappelle quiet, unless it's to prevent a run on the coffee machine when everybody decides to take a break at the same time.
Out on the floor, Chappelle catches up with Kiefer and asks him what Palmer wanted. Kiefer leads him into the conference room and closes the door just as the clock briefly pops up showing 6:09:21, lest we think we're about to hear the same information for the fourth time in nine minutes. We only hear it the fourth time in ten minutes. Kiefer doesn't mince words: "[Saunders] wants you killed." Chappelle is just as flummoxed about this as everyone else, but he seems to take it a little more personally. Go figure. He asks Kiefer, "Is Palmer actually going along with this?" Kiefer says nothing. When Kiefer says nothing, it's usually bad, and he does it twice in this conversation. Kiefer asks Chappelle if he has any connection with Saunders, but Chappelle insists that he's never heard of Saunders before today. They argue. Chappelle reminds Kiefer that he hasn't been able to trace anything to Saunders, but Kiefer insists that the fact that Saunders wants Chappelle dead proves that he's getting too close. Kiefer gets to the point: "Finding Saunders in time is the only way to keep you alive." Ladies and gentlemen, we have a theme. I should mention that Kiefer hasn't bothered to take off his flak jacket since returning to the office. I suppose if you're going to wear a bulletproof vest into a meeting with your boss, this would be that meeting. Kiefer finally gets Chappelle to sit down at his computer and start sending data to Potato Face. As Chappelle does so, Kiefer puts a comforting hand on Chappelle's shoulder and says, "I'm sorry, Ryan. Let's find this guy." Kiefer leaves Chappelle alone so he can discreetly close that solitaire game he has running in a minimized window. The time is 6:11:28.
At 6:15:53, Chappelle scowls at his monitor while more Inn Fection guests go into quarantine. Kiefer comes back into Chappelle's office just as Chappelle succeeds in opening some Saunders-related document that turns out to be encrypted. Kiefer tells him to send it to Potato Face for decryption, but Chappelle decides that there's no time for that and he'd rather freak, thanks. "This is it, Kiefer, don't you understand?" Kiefer says nothing. Stop doing that, Kiefer. It's not helping, and it gives Chappelle an opening: "Of course you understand. You're the one who's going to kill me." Instead of saying, "So now is good for you, then?" Kiefer talks him down, sort of, and Chappelle forwards the encrypted file to Potato Face.
It's 6:17:12 at Inn Fection, and the quarantine area is getting more and more crowded. It's standing room only in there, literally, which is going to make things pretty uncomfortable when people start keeling over. How about some beds for the sick people? Bitchelle watches each victim getting herded inside. The one is Gay Matt, blood pouring from his nose down his face and onto his shirt. Bitchelle looks crushed at the sight of him. Gay Matt quietly begs Bitchelle to let him call his wife. I'm still calling him Gay Matt. Bitchelle apologetically refuses, explaining that they're still under orders to keep this quiet to avoid a panic. Gay Matt promises not to tell his wife anything; he just wants to hear her voice. Bitchelle looks like she's about to break down, or maybe she's thinking about how she gets to keep in touch with her hubby, but she shuts Gay Matt down anyway. He gets led into quarantine while she tries not to crack. And now it's time for her little announcement. She turns to address the victims, and the camera shoots her through the plastic sheeting so her features are blurred. She explains that once symptoms of the V-I-R-U-S appear, there's no chance of recovery, that death will be extremely painful, and that the estimated time of death is some time before the season finale. She tells them about the suicide capsules that are on the way: "Some pills that will basically make you feel like you're going to sleep." Yes, that's just the thing for an agent who only has seconds to avoid capture and torture: going to sleep. Those must come in handy. Bitchelle explains that it's up to each of them to decide when and if they want to take the pills. We see the quietly sobbing victims from her point of view, again through the plastic sheeting. Yes, we get it. Through a glass darkly and all that shit. Bitchelle wraps up her little speech with a businesslike "Thank you." Surprisingly, nobody says, "Thank you." Bitchelle walks off, almost completely wrecked, but she doesn't have more than a second or two to be wrecked before a hazmatician comes up to her and tells her that one of the guests appears to be missing. Apparently, a woman has lost track of the guy she was with.
Bitchelle finds said woman in the lobby. She's a sad-looking redhead named Kathy who tells Bitchelle she met some guy at a club on Hill earlier tonight. All she knows about him is his name -- Bill -- and some stuff about his penis, but she doesn't share that last part. When the fire alarm woke her up, Bill from Hill was gone, even though he was still there when she fell asleep exactly at 4:02. It's always a good idea to look at the clock immediately before you go to sleep, you know, in case you wake up to a federal agent who wants to know what time it was. This guy's not anywhere in the hotel, and the room was booked in Kathy's name, so they have no idea how to locate this Typhoid Leisure Suit Larry who's running around and rendering their quarantine moot. Bitchelle orders a hazmat-less agent named Miller to dust the hotel room for fingerprints. He points out that it's a hotel room, and there will be dozens of prints there. Nice try, dude, but I still don't think Bitchelle is going to let you dust Kathy's boobs. Bitchelle tells Kathy to come with her up to the room: "You need to show me every surface that Bill may have touched." Jeez, Bitchelle, aren't we supposed to be in a hurry? Just strip Kathy naked in the lobby, would you? Lives are at stake here.
6:21:26, CTU. Soul Patch notifies Kiefer that Special Agent Charlie Brown has a strike team ready to go as soon as they know where Saunders is, and that Soul Patch has arranged a chopper to ferry Chappelle to the train yard: "We can't afford to be slowed down by rush-hour traffic." I'm sure Chappelle feels the same way. And can I just say how marvelous it is that the first time this show acknowledges Los Angeles traffic, it's because it threatens their chances of killing the boss in time? Potato Face calls Kiefer over and tells him it might be ninety minutes before she can crack the encryption, which Kiefer is none too impressed with. Potato Face says, "I'm doing my very best. Your tone of voice isn't exactly a morale booster." Potato Face obviously doesn't spend much time on the boards. Kiefer looks like he wishes her morale were in her ass so he could give it a boost with his foot, but he walks away instead. As some random blonde with a long bowl-cut steps up to help Potato Face in the background, Kiefer looks over to the glass-walled conference room where he left Chappelle. Which is now empty. As are all of the surrounding glass-walled offices. Whoopsie. "Oh, Ryan," Kiefer breathes. Every gay man in the world named Ryan now has a new Windows startup sound.
It's 6:22:36. Chappelle walks through the hallways alone. A uniformed security guard stops him and asks him to go back to the office. Chappelle tries to lay down a little rank-pulling smack, but the guard doesn't even pretend to be afraid of him. That's just sad. Just then, Kiefer appears from the office with two more uniforms behind him. Chappelle acts all offended at the implication that he might be trying to run: "I wouldn't condemn millions of people to death so I could live." Dude, you didn't feel that way eleven minutes ago. He claims he was just heading outside for a smoke break. Kiefer's not buying it, because in three years nobody on this show has had a chance to pee, let alone have a puff in the parking lot. He asks to see Chappelle's cigarettes. Chappelle just stands there until Kiefer invokes his presidentially-imparted authority and orders Chappelle to a holding room, escorted by the guards. This is one of those things they teach you in security guard school: everybody outranks the guy who's probably going to be dead by the end of your shift. Before he goes with the guards, Chappelle gives Kiefer a poisonous look and a pack of Camel Lights. Kiefer feels like a prick, but Chappelle's still going to the cooler instead of sucking a heater. It's 6:23:52.
6:28:15. Chappelle stews in holding, Saunders makes Zoolander faces at his computer, that random blonde chick with the bad haircut stares at something (pretty colors, she thinks), and Miller questions Kathy in her hotel room. Bitchelle is also in the room, calling Soul Patch with the bad news about Bill from Hill's departure from Inn Fection after the V-I-R-U-S was released but before the lockdown was in full effect. She explains Bill from Hill's status as an anonymous one-night stand, and that he probably doesn't know he's been exposed to anything more deadly than Kathy's sweet lovin'. Bitchelle ends the call with a promise to send over any potential Bill from Hill prints they find. Then she returns her attention to Kathy and makes her go over her romantic interlude one more time. Kathy's too freaked out to really sell the erotic narrative of her and Bill from Hill coming into the room and him undressing her, but it's enough for Bitchelle; she drops into a crouch and dives for Kathy's belt. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about! Oh, wait, she's just looking for Bill from Hill's prints on the buckle. Dammit. Miller finds a partial thumbprint that isn't Kathy's, scans it in, and uploads it to CTU on Bitchelle's orders. Kathy sits on the bed, having been roundly dissed by her second partner in as many hours.
6:30:25. A guy in a suit sneaks into a dark bedroom, looking guilty. I assume this is Bill from Hill. Hey, it's Gavin Price! A blonde in the bed reaches up and turns on a bedside lamp while he tries not to look too busted. She asks where he's been. He bounces some lame excuses about a client meeting and how he thought she knew he wouldn't come home if it went too late, and he didn't call her because he didn't want to wake her up. I'd almost believe the middle part, considering that it took him more than two hours to get home from Inn Fection. Does he commute by unicycle? During this whole time, he doesn't come near her, presumably because he knows he reeks of forbidden poontang. Mrs. Bill from Hill seems a little suspicious, especially when Bill from Hill goes straight into the attached bathroom, but she doesn't say another word. He looks in the mirror. This actor has always oozed smug smarm from every pore, but at the moment he seems more concerned about the fact that he's just started oozing blood from his nose. Uh-oh.
At CTU, Potato Face calls Kiefer and Soul Patch over; she's cracked the encryption protecting Saunders's data. Kiefer tells her to look for an address, and the camera pans over to that random blonde chick with the bad haircut and -- sweet Christ, it's Spawn! In a suit! At a desk! What have they done to her? Sorry, I'm back. The document in question is Saunders's financial records, and somehow it proves that Saunders was at an apartment five minutes from CTU no more than forty-five minutes ago. Well, that's lucky. Special Agent Charlie Brown's strike team gets to go ahead, but Kiefer warns, "Tell him not go in hard; Saunders can't see us coming." I'm not saying a word. Kiefer congratulates everyone, then dashes to Chappelle's holding room to break the news. Chappelle pulls Kiefer into a relieved hug. You know, Gustave wrote about how Chappelle never gets to actually punish anyone. Going by Kiefer's weirded-out reaction now and Bitchelle's several episodes ago, maybe Chappelle should start disciplining people by hugging them. Then in Season Four we could look forward to tense dialogue like, "If you disobey a direct order, Chappelle's going to squeeze you like a zit." That's assuming Chappelle is still alive at the end of this episode, which, as Kiefer reminds us, is not yet certain. He still wants Chappelle to come with him to the train yard just in case they don't get Saunders after all. Chappelle looks less relieved, but he agrees to accompany Kiefer to the helipad. As they walk through the office full of coworkers who are either unaware of or incurious about Chappelle's brief period of confinement, Potato Face mentions that Division called to confirm Chappelle's three o'clock briefing. "Is that still good?" she asks. "Sure," Chappelle says, as casually as he can. Hey, Chappelle, I don't think you're going to be able to take that anvil on the helicopter. Spawn watches them blankly. They walk out the door at 6:33:06.
A guy comes into the office with Palmer and Brother Palmer, saying he's starting to get calls from the Los Angeles Times about what's going on at Inn Fection. His assessment is that the reporter was fishing. I guess this guy must be Palmer's press secretary. Palmer and Brother Palmer agree that Poor Man's Scott McClellan will be better able to handle the press if he knows what's going on. That guy? He looks like he would have trouble handling a moderately aggressive telemarketer. But Palmer didn't listen to me the first two seasons, and he isn't about to start now. They bring him into the loop. Brother Palmer watches his reaction closely, or perhaps he's trying to get Poor Man's Scott McClellan to tell him how pretty he is. Poor Man's Scott McClellan swallows hard and goes back out to face the voracious news media, which is barely even nibbling yet. I smell a weak link. The V-I-R-U-S may not be the only thing that's about to get out.
It's 6:34:35 at CTU. Kiefer and Chappelle walk out onto the roof and into a golden sunrise that symbolizes hope and renewal, except for all those people who are about to die. Kiefer and Chappelle are heading for the helipad when Special Agent Charlie Brown shows his round, beat-up face for the first time in the episode. He wants to know why Kiefer isn't part of the strike team that's going after Saunders. Chappelle makes up some ridiculous lie about wanting Kiefer to answer questions downtown, and I don't know if it says more about him or Charlie Brown that he is instantly believed. Charlie Brown lays into Chappelle: "You know what, Ryan? All you do is put obstacles in our way. We have a chance to get Saunders. We need our best people and you tie us down with your bureaucratic BS." Ooh, watch it, Charlie Brown. He might hug you. But no, Chappelle just sadly says, "Those are the orders," and keeps walking toward the chopper. Special Agent Charlie Brown's super secret agent senses finally tell him something's up, and he asks Kiefer what it is. Kiefer's not saying. Man, Special Agent Charlie Brown is going to feel like such a putz if Kiefer comes back alone and with one less bullet. As the symphonically heroic (or perhaps heroically symphonic) music swells, Kiefer climbs into the helicopter's pilot seat to Chappelle. The chopper lifts off and flits into the sunrise. So now we know that CTU is west of downtown, I guess. It's 6:36:02.
6:40:25. Chappelle takes what might be his final flight while Bitchelle tries not to fall asleep. An SUV pulls into a parking garage and disgorges Special Agent Charlie Brown and Special Agent Tom Baker, whom you may recall from season two as the character Gustave dubbed "Hot Asian from Angel." Charlie Brown and Baker scope out the building that Potato Face's investigative skills led them to, trying to work out how they're going to get past the guards outside without tipping off Saunders.
That gentleman, meanwhile, is busy at his workstation when a minion comes up to tell him that flights out of LAX are being grounded. Saunders asks whether all of the couriers made it out with their vials, and learns that the V-I-R-U-S is on its way to New York, Washington, and San Francisco. A guy is driving to Vegas, but Chicago and Cleveland won't be getting their deliveries. I'm glad to see Saunders isn't wasting his time on Minneapolis. This is flu country. We keep viruses as pets up here. Some of us marry them. Saunders's minion still estimates two to five million dead within the first forty-eight hours. Saunders shrugs: "Good enough." Hey, he's more easygoing than he lets on. The minion warns that there's a chance the V-I-R-U-S might spread beyond the Americas, and Saunders says, "We'll be fine. Don't worry." Whatever that means. The minion withdraws as Saunders turns his attention back to his monitors, pausing a few seconds to indulge in a chilly "I'm eventually going to kill that guy" take at the camera.
CTU. At 6:42:22, Adam the Woman Hater tells Soul Patch that the partial print from Kathy's belt buckle is a possible match for almost three hundred people. We can probably eliminate most of the women. Soul Patch orders pictures of the potential matches uploaded to Bitchelle at Inn Fection so Kathy can identify her gentleman caller. Hey, I thought that Bitchelle uploaded data to them! Data can't go uphill both ways, can it? Whatever. Spawn lets Soul Patch know that Chappelle is calling from the helicopter. Soul Patch picks up the call, but he quickly regrets it as Chappelle, talking through one of the helicopter's headsets, tries to micromanage Special Agent Charlie Brown's raid from the air. Jeez, some people get so tense when they have seventeen minutes to live. Through his own headset, Kiefer assures Chappelle that Special Agent Charlie Brown knows what's at stake. Um, no, he doesn't, Kiefer. You didn't see fit to tell him. Soul Patch manages to shut Chappelle up by patching him through to Charlie Brown's real-time audio so he can hear what's going on. I wish I had real-time audio. Kiefer announces that he's spotted the train yard, and we get several angles of the chopper coming down in split screen because that shit is expensive and the producers want to make the most of it.
Back at the apartment building, Special Agent Charlie Brown's strike team is moving. One of Saunders's guards gets shot by an agent doing a drive-by in a street sweeper (a street sweeper! Man, CTU has everything!), while Special Agent Charlie Brown and Baker take out two more by coming around opposite corners of the building. That was kind of impressive; three guys went from zero to dead in five seconds flat. Charlie Brown and Baker head in through the front door, while two more agents scale the fire escape ladder to the roof. Special Agent Charlie Brown is seen creeping across one of Saunders's flat-screen security monitors, but Saunders has a lot of monitors and a manila folder to occupy his attention, and he appears oblivious. Suspenseful "music" that sounds like somebody playing a high-tension power line with a pair of hammers plays as the four agents work their way deeper into the building, silenced handguns at the ready. Charlie Brown reports on their progress as Kiefer, Chappelle, and the people at CTU listen in. They take out two more bad guys in the hallway, and the thing we know, Baker is taping an explosive charge to a locked door. Wow, this is really going remarkably well. Suspiciously well, in fact. A contingent of five slow-moving guards seems a little light for a details guy like Saunders, now that I think about it. A scant two and half minutes after the raid began, Baker blows the door, and Special Agent Charlie Brown charges into -- an empty room. There's nothing there but an electronic box, which tells Special Agent Charlie Brown that Saunders has been relaying his calls through the building without actually being there. He totally pulled a Silence of the Lambs. Wait, Saunders outsmarted Potato Face? That's unpossible!
Chappelle, of course, hears this all on the chopper's headset. He doesn't say a word. Paul Schulze barely moves, and yet he does a great job of conveying just how profoundly it sucks to be Chappelle at this particular moment. Kiefer slowly takes off his headset, and Chappelle follows suit. They just sit there for a minute, staring straight ahead, knowing their one shot is over and they blew it. Time's up. The clock appears at the bottom of the screen, showing 6:47:02, just in case anyone gets the idea that they're going to try and find Saunders all over again in thirteen minutes. Kiefer's cell phone goes off. It's Saunders: "You underestimate me, Kiefer." Wow, so did I. I didn't think Saunders knew Kiefer was going to be the one to kill Chappelle. In fact the only people who did know are Kiefer, Chappelle, Soul Patch, Palmer, and Brother Palmer. Either this is sloppy plotting, or Saunders is hacked into CTU's communications, or one of those five people is a mole. And I think we can rule out Chappelle. Instead of asking Saunders how he got his information, Kiefer asks why Chappelle has to die, now that it's clear that Chappelle's line of investigation was a dead end all along. Chappelle's ears prick up when he realizes whom Kiefer is talking to; he's obviously clinging to some hope for a reprieve. Saunders doesn't explain his motives. He simply instructs Kiefer to leave Chappelle's body with the driver of a van that will be arriving shortly. Kiefer mustn't try to follow that van, or Saunders will release the V-I-R-U-S. Learn a new tune, will you, Saunders? He hangs up on Kiefer, and Chappelle can tell that nothing's changed. It's 6:48:27.
6:52:50. Chappelle faces his mortality, Kiefer faces his failure, Inn Fection guests bleed into their handkerchiefs, and a hazmatician schleps a silver briefcase into the isolation area. She sets the case down on a table and opens it so everyone can see what's inside. It's the suicide pills. The hazmatician offers them up while Bitchelle stands by. There are no takers for several seconds, and then an older couple makes their way to the front. The man's walking behind the woman with his hands on her shoulders so it looks like he's steering her, which under the circumstances is a little creepy. They get their party favors and step aside. We don't see them take the pills. Middle-Aged Elijah Wood is . I'm sure Bitchelle would love to stand and watch this all day, but Miller comes by to tell her that the fingerprint they found allowed them to narrow the field of potential Bills from Hill to twelve men. Kathy's paging through electronic mug shots of them as we speak. Miller leads Bitchelle to Kathy just as a photo of Bill from Hill pops up on the monitor. Kathy fingers him, perhaps not for the first time. "Find him," Bitchelle snaps at Miller.
The editors are way ahead of her, but it's not like it's hard; he's still in the bathroom, becoming increasingly freaked about his persistent nosebleed and clammy face. Mrs. Bill from Hill taps on the door: "Are you okay, William? You've been in there for a while." Yeah, over twenty minutes, going by the clock on the screen showing 6:54:33. She's awfully patient, considering she's been up for this long and hasn't had a chance to pee yet. Good thing she's a 24 character. Bill from Hill says he's got "some kind of bug," and Mrs. Bill from Hill offers to make him some tea. Bill from Hill declines, saying he has to go into the office for a staff meeting. Mrs. Bill from Hill retreats. You know, Mrs. Bill from Hill, I hear they're doing wonderful things with spines these days. Bill from Hill stares at himself in the mirror, thinking, What the fuck did that chick give me, anyway?
Kiefer and Chappelle are still sitting in the parked helicopter, staring into space and not saying a word. There are no obvious indications that they have spent any of the last seven minutes making out. A black van with no license plates pulls into view some distance away. Jack calls Adam at CTU and tells him to get a surveillance satellite pointed at his location so they can try to track the van when it leaves with Chappelle's body. Chappelle thinks, Good ide-- oh, wait, I won't care any more.
This is a tough scene right here, and both guys act the shit out of it. Kiefer says, "We have to go, Ryan," and slowly gets out of the helicopter. He walks around to Chappelle's side and opens the door for him. Chappelle doesn't move. "My legs are shaking," he confesses. Kiefer tells him, "I got you." He helps Chappelle out of the chopper and walks with him some distance off, but still in sight of the van. Kiefer offers Chappelle a moment to call someone. Chappelle says, "I have a brother I haven't spoken to in years. I don't have that many friends. Just people at work. So, no. No one." Which sucks for him, especially in light of his last exchange with Special Agent Charlie Brown, but we're almost out of time anyway. I don't know why Kiefer doesn't offer him one of his Camel Lights. Maybe he thinks it would be too clichéd, or simply too incongruous if unaccessorized with a jaunty blindfold. Kiefer gently directs Chappelle to get on his knees, and steers him down with a hand on the shoulder. Chappelle asks Kiefer one last time whether there's an out. Sympathy is pouring off of Kiefer in waves, but he's out of ideas. He jacks a round into the chamber of his handgun as loudly as he possibly can.
Chappelle says, "Wait," just as a tear spills from one eye. He begs Kiefer to let him do it himself. Kiefer doesn't want to take the chance. Chappelle admits that he was indeed trying to flee earlier when Kiefer stopped him, but now he realizes what needs to happen and he only wants the dignity of taking his own life. He gives Kiefer his word that he won't run. Well, that word-giving thing always works for Kiefer, so he can't exactly say no to Chappelle now. He does something with his gun -- I assume he's taking out all of the bullets save one so Chappelle can't try to shoot his way out of this, but it's not at all clear since this particular moment is filmed from fifty yards away. In any case, Kiefer then hands the gun to Chappelle, who, still on his knees, puts the muzzle to his temple, screws up his face, musters all his courage, and finds it lacking. "I can't," he says. So much for dignity. "It's all right," Kiefer says. He takes the gun back and goes behind Chappelle again. He says, "I'm sorry we all let you down." Chappelle just shakes his head. Kiefer trains the weapon on Chappelle's bald spot, displaying a degree of tact by not pointing out that in ten seconds it won't be there any more. Kiefer says, "God forgive me." The camera is close on Kiefer's devastated face as he pulls the trigger. From fifty yards off, we see Chappelle's body flop forward onto the ground. Bye, Chappelle. You kind of sucked a little less towards the end there. A mournful train whistle is the only sound as the clock ticks silently to 7:00:00.
on 24: Spawn is asked to go undercover as Saunders's daughter. Oh, thank God. I was beginning to worry that this show had lost all of its silly.