In a hurry? Read the recaplet for a nutshell description! Finished? Click here to close.
Quite a bit of fallout from last week to deal with, as Kiefer's and CTU's problems begin to mushroom. If you catch my drift. DoDder is pissed at Kiefer over Grayadder's death. The Chinese are pissed at the U.S. government over their Consul's death. And the Veep's pissed at Palmer for the mess he's made. So now, while CTU is supposed to be looking for the warhead, they have to simultaneously put off and play host to a guy from the consulate who's trying to prove Kiefer led the raid, and not doing a terrible job of it. Was kidnapping Lee and sacrificing Grayadder's life worth it? Well, yes and no. Lee directs Kiefer to ImhoTerror's latest base, and they actually manage to nab him this time. Seriously! Kiefer treats ImhoTerror to a non-fatal gunshot wound and then wastes precious seconds having gun-sex with his enemy in a rather gross and scary way. By the time ImhoTerror lets slip that the warhead will be delivered via missile, it's too late to prevent that missile's launch. It blasts off its barnyard pad a few seconds before four o'clock. On the bright side, the fact that a nuke is airborne and on its way to an as-yet-unknown target should speed up week's early-episode exposition follies. Right? Want more? The full recap starts right below!
Previously on 24: CTU watched the ImhoTape of the bad guy which imhoplied that he planned to detonate a nuclear weapon before dawn. "President David Palmer," as he's now described in his freeze-frame (which I guess would make him "Former Ex-President David Palmer"), was basically reinstalled by the Veep and briefed on a guy named Lee who was connected to ImhoTerror. Lee was also connected to the Chinese government, in the sense of taking refuge in the Chinese Consulate in L.A. It was going to take too long for the Chinese to hand over Lee the legal way, so Palmer sent Kiefer in to get him covertly. Two things went wrong: one was that one of Kiefer's team members was briefly unmasked during the ensuing melee, and the other was that the Chinese Consul was shot by his own guards. Lee started dying before he could tell Kiefer anything, which was bad luck for Grayadder, who was also dying. Kiefer ganked Grayadder's surgeon to save Lee, and Grayadder died. DoDder was hella pissed. The following takes place between 3:00 AM and 4:00 AM.
We're still in the operating room, where Grayadder's face is being covered with a sheet. "Is [Lee] going to make it?" Kiefer asks. "I'm doing the best I can," bitches Dr. Besson. Funny, it looked like the previouslies were over. Kiefer again tells Besson that he just needs Lee coherent long enough to give up the goods on ImhoTerror. Besson snaps that Kiefer "made me aware of that when you forced me to sacrifice Grayadder's life." So Besson's just as tired of the unnecessary exposition as we are. Curtis suggests to Kiefer that they leave, and he does so, with a shitty-feeling Kiefer not far behind.
And he feels even shittier when he realizes he's now got to face DoDder, who's out in the hallway by herself, crying. Nice of Curtis to blow right by her, huh? Kiefer tries to break the tension with a joke about a monkey and a cop walking into a bar. No, not really. He tries minimizing DoDder's loss by saying, "After you left, Grayadder woke up for a second and said he never liked you and then died again." No, his overture is, "Huh. So that happened. Dinner?" If only any one of those things had happened. Instead, he approaches DoDder and whispers, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry." "How could you kill him, Kiefer?" DoDder weeps, and comes at him again, although with not much force this time. Kiefer is able to pull her into an uneasy hug, and she sobs in his arms for a few seconds before pushing away, saying, "I can't be near you right now." Kiefer's at a loss, and he reaches out to touch her back, but loses his nerve at the last second. It's not clear whether DoDder actually wants him to back off or not. Kiefer asks DoDder what she wants him to do, and she says she wants him to leave. He stands there looking bereft for a couple more seconds, then grants her wish without another word passing between them. Too bad, because I like DoDder a lot more when she's not talking.
In the hallway, Kiefer meets up with Buchanan, who tells him to call Poor Man's Hume Cronyn at the White House right away. Kiefer agrees, but Buchanan knows something's up. Kiefer makes Buchanan his father confessor, telling him about Grayadder's death. "There was only one doctor and I had to make a choice between Lee's life and Grayadder and I chose Lee." He's doing that thing where people carefully separate their words because they're trying not to cry. Buchanan tells Kiefer he did the right thing. Nice how quickly he got over being left out of the loop on Kiefer's last mission. Just threw himself a little wobbler on Soul Patch and now he's all done. Kind of functional, really. He asks if Kiefer's okay. Kiefer says he's not. Awkward pause. If he's expecting a hug from Buchanan, he's out of luck. Too bad he shot Chappelle last season, huh? Now there was a huggy boss. Kiefer apologizes to Buchanan and asks to be told when Lee's out of surgery.
Kiefer makes his call to PMHC, who wants to know what they've learned from Lee, which, thus far, is nothing. PMHC reminds Kiefer of the risk they took getting Lee. "Trust me, I know," Kiefer growls. PMHC says there's more bad news, and tells Kiefer about the Chinese Consul's shooting. Kiefer insists that none of his men fired a shot, so PMHC says that means the Consul was shot by his own guys. Kiefer asks, "How bad is he hurt?" PMHC says the Consul died. "Oh, my God," Kiefer breathes, realizing this is big. PMHC instructs Kiefer to make sure everyone on his team has an alibi. "We're trying to avoid a confrontation with China," he finishes, in a blatant attempt to get into this week's promo. Kiefer says he'll handle it, and hangs up. Nothing like a new crisis to help Kiefer deal with fresh grief, no?
And now we get an early commercial, but I have to recap it because it's written into the script of the show and features some of its characters. At her computer, Potato Face gets a warning screen that prominently features the name of a certain internet router company whose name rhymes with Crisco. Looks like some kind of traffic spike. She heads over to report to Buchanan that "Somebody's trying to jam our satellite server." Buchanan wonders if it might not be an innocuous high network load, but Potato Face bitchily insists that it's a denial of service attack. "What do you want me to do?" Buchanan asks if any damage is done, but she says the Crisco system is "self-defending." Good golly, we gotta get us one of those at TWoP Towers. Buchanan tells her to have someone use the "security auditor tool" in the hope that it'll lead them to ImhoTerror's location. "That was my point from the start," she whines, and begins to stomp off. Liar. If that was your point, why did you ask Buchanan what to do? Fortunately, he calls her on it: "We're in the middle of an active code. We don't have time for your personality disorder." Ah, my favorite part of every season she's been in. So many viewers relate to Potato Face because she's socially inept. I say that lots of people are socially inept without also being assholes. She gives us socially inept people a bad name, and I for one am through enabling it. She swallows her shock and outrage at being called out and tells Buchanan, "Yes, sir." Go, Buchanan! And for that matter, go, Cisco Systems! Best commercial ever! Glark, please buy one of everything they sell.
It's 3:07:33 as ImhoTerror calls yet another new minion from the shotgun seat of a van. Guess he's not worried about traffic cams any more. What does worry him is that the minion – who's sitting in an empty factory somewhere running a laptop -- just told him that he can't jam CTU's satellites, thanks to the fabulous, shiny, life-changing new Cisco security feature that CTU just installed in the past week. ImhoTerror says this means they'll have to move up their schedule an hour. Laptop Minion (which sounds kind of dirty, I know, but this many minions into the season, I'm so beyond caring) protests that there "won't be as many casualties if people aren't at work." ImhoTerror says that if the Laptop Minion can't jam CTU's satellites, they'll be found. Which presumably means there won't be any casualties at all, except on ImhoTerror's side. Laptop Minion understands.
Outside the Undal Office, PMHC wants to know how long they're going to keep the Veep unaware of the raid on the Consulate. Palmer says as long as possible, although he doesn't explain why. He's really not any better at breaking the rules than he ever was, is he? They get the slower-moving viewers caught up on Lee's continuing inability to talk, as well as Kiefer's confirmation that his guys didn't shoot the Consul. "The Chinese won't care," says Palmer. "He died as a result of our trespass. We have to start constructing a scenario that doesn't implicate the United States government." PMHC says the Chinese will be hard to convince, but Palmer says, "The Chinese don't want a confrontation any more than we do. If we can create a scenario of plausible deniability, they may play along." Palmer tells PMHC to have CTU pull a list of groups who have attacked Chinese embassies and consulates in the past five years. PMHC says those groups are mostly Asian, but Palmer reminds us that Kiefer's team was masked. "No one saw their faces." Well, the guards would have seen the CTU team's eyes, which, as I understand it, is one of the more reliable indicators of an individual's Asian-ness or non-Asian-ness. That's the kind of thing that sets off an observer's A-dar.
Ahem. A subtitle facilitates our transition to the Chinese Consulate in Los Angeles. The Deputy Chinese Consul, a uniformed security guard, and another Chinese guy in a suit are reviewing security camera footage of the raid. The other guy in the suit is, coincidentally, the actor who played the Chinese Consul in Los Angeles in Rush Hour. He's apparently been demoted to the position of the Consulate's head of security since then, and he doesn't look too happy about it. Or maybe he's unhappy about watching a masked Kiefer punching out the DCC and Lee and bodily hauling the latter out of the building. As Palmer said, everyone on the team was masked. Until we get to the point where Curtis and the Briefly Unmasked Agent entered the courtyard, and the Briefly Unmasked Agent was briefly unmasked. The footage is grainy, but they're able to zoom in and enhance it, although not nearly as quickly or as well as with the bleeding-edge, state-of-the-art image enhancement software that's owned by CTU. And Soul Patch, of course. After a few seconds, they end up with a somewhat clearer picture. The security head -- Consulate Cop, we'll call him -- wants the shot of the Briefly Unmasked Agent sent to Beijing and Shanghai and then cross-referenced with their intelligence databases. The guard moves to comply. In Chinese, of course.
3:10:42. Kiefer goes into the room where Curtis and the other agents have changed back into their non-Consulate-invading clothes, and tells them about the Consulate's death and how they all need alibis that place them somewhere else tonight so the attack can't be traced to the U.S. government. The Briefly Unmasked Agent wants to know, "Are we gonna be brought into this?" Hey, you were "brought into it" when you entered the Consulate, chief. Kiefer says he doesn't know, but "It's our responsibility to make sure that the United States government is never implicated in this operation." The Briefly Unmasked Agent looks troubled. We can tell because he's unmasked.
ImhoTerror's latest hideout looks like an abandoned factory with cargo nets hung artfully around the otherwise empty space. Empty, that is, aside from the Laptop Minion sitting at a desk, who greets the arriving ImhoTerror and says that the launch team is ready to make the changes. Laptop Minion asks whether CTU will find them before the launch, but ImhoTerror says they'll be okay if he moves up the launch time. "They're looking for the warhead in the cities. They have no idea that it's going to be delivered by missile." I suspect that until an episode or two ago, the writers didn't either. He takes over the laptop and dons a headset, and he's instantly in touch with Keith Szettingeverythingup, who's standing outside to a missile that's already set up on a mobile launcher. I'd be interested to learn where those two items came from, and why their disappearance didn't raise any alarms. I suspect the answer may lie a few sentences back. ImhoTerror and Keith Szowunderusedthizweejk get their respective laptops synced up, and before the commercial we get a nice little glamour shot of the missile with steam pouring out of its rear nozzle. I don't know if that actually happens, but I don't care enough to look it up. It's 3:12:22.
3:16:43. The Consulate Cop reads a file, Lee is still under the knife, and Potato Face is still under my skin. At CTU, Buchanan tells Kiefer they want to be ready to move as soon as Lee talks. Kiefer agrees, then swoops in to the computer to Potato Face and technobabbles at her about some data they're expecting from the DoD. Potato Face asks if that's been authorized. Kiefer looks across the floor at DoDder, who's doing some work of her own, and says he still needs to talk to her. Potato Face: "That's gonna be weird." Kiefer foolishly asks why that is, I think because he doesn't realize that she already knows what happened. Silly Kiefer, Potato Face always knows. For somebody who's so "socially inept," she doesn't seem to have trouble finding someone to keep her up to speed on the office gossip. To wit: "You had to do what you did and her husband died…probably destroyed your relationship --" Kiefer cuts her off. She adds, "I just want you to know, if you ever need anyone to talk to, as a friend, I'm here for you." Kiefer slowly turns his head and meets her gaze with a look of pure horror. Hee! "Not now, but later, when things calm down," Potato Face clarifies. Kiefer takes his out and leaves, thanking her.
And now, Kiefer's got to go talk to the girlfriend he just widowed to get her authorization on the DoD technobabble. She asks emotionlessly, "Were you able to keep Lee alive?" Kiefer says he's stabilized, and DoDder agrees to call the home office to get Kiefer his technobabble. Since when is technobabble Kiefer's job, anyway? Take a break, dude. If you really need to be doing something every minute, I'm sure someone else will come along for you to kill or torture soon.
In the conference room, Curtis is running a meeting whose centerpiece is a map of the United States. He points to Eastern Iowa, where the warhead was stolen. No air traffic has been observed, which means that if the warhead is being transported, it's staying on the ground. Which in turn means they have a 300-mile search radius, an area that includes three major metropolitan areas. One of those metropolitan areas is, naturally, the Twin Cities. Jeez, 24, was it something I said? Aside from the last 27 recaps, I mean? Soul Patch asks if those cities have been alerted, but Buchanan says the Veep wants to keep it quiet for now. He tells everyone to concentrate on finding the warhead (rather than sitting in pointless meetings, one presumes), because while it's still the middle of the night, any trail ImhoTerror leaves is going to be easier to spot than when people start going to work in a couple of hours. Hmm, how could we prevent that from happening? The meeting breaks up at 3:18:54.
People are still speaking Chinese at the Chinese Consulate. One of them is the uniformed guard, who shows a photo to the Consulate Cop. It's from a dossier on the Briefly Unmasked Agent, and he's the closest match they could find. We can now see the Briefly Unmasked Agent's name, which is Howard Bern. Given what his unmasking, however brief, could do to the U.S. Government, I'm going to start calling him Agent Burn. The Consulate Cop wants to call CTU, even though the guard says they won't cooperate. "They'll have to," says Consulate Cop. "It would be a diplomatic mistake for them not to cooperate under the circumstances." He whips out his cell phone and Chineses, "Get me the head of CTU Los Angeles."
That lady is at the moment engaged in a round of technobabble with Lispy Skip when the Consulate Cop's call comes through. Bitchelle screws in her earpiece and walks off to take the call in private. The Consulate Cop introduces himself in English while Bitchelle goes into a conference room to conduct the call in private. She expresses her sympathy about the death of the Consul, and offers to help. Consulate Cop wants to talk to her about it -- now. Bitchelle tries to shoot that down, but Consulate Cop is insistent: "The murder of a Chinese Consul on Chinese soil could be construed as an act of war." And he thinks CTU was behind it. Bitchelle bites her lip and lets that hang for a second. "That is an outrageous accusation," she states. The Consulate Cop reminds us that Lee was kidnapped less than a half hour after the U.S. government asked to speak to him. "It is unlikely that the two events are unrelated," he understates. Bitchelle still isn't budging, so Consulate Cop threatens to go over her head. "I'm sure you'll do what you have to," Bitchelle says. "Very well, Ms. Dessler," Consulate Cop says cheerily. "You will be hearing from me soon." They hang up, and Consulate Cop's call is to the United States Secretary of State.
Kiefer approaches DoDder again and thanks her for the help with the technobabble. "You're welcome," she says. Kiefer starts to leave, but comes back to suggest she get some rest. "Don't tell me what to do," she says quietly. Kiefer starts to respond, but refrains in favor of a needy stare. "What do want from me?" DoDder says. "You made a choice that killed Grayadder and I'm trying to deal with it." Kiefer doesn't have an answer for that, and she stomps off.
Buchanan comes up with the news about the call from Consulate Cop at 3:22:07, saying that the Chinese are claiming to have evidence that CTU was behind the kidnapping. "They don't have any evidence," says Kiefer. "They're bluffing." And besides, they don't have time to deal with it now anyway. Buchanan says they don't have much choice, and asks for Kiefer's help with the situation. I don't think this scene was supposed to happen yet, since last we saw, the Consulate Cop was getting blown off. Kiefer says he'll help Buchanan right after he checks on Lee. Sparing another glance across the room at DoDder, he heads back to the clinic.
Outside the Undal Office, PMHC shows Palmer the list of anti-Chinese groups that CTU just faxed over. As a bonus, one of the groups has even referred to Lee in its speeches. They're all excited about how now they can blame their actions on some poor, innocent extremist group. PMHC is on his way to start leaking it to the media when the Veep storms in, loaded for bear. "David, what have you done?" he demands. He just found out about the raid on the Consulate from the Secretary of State. "That's right, I sanctioned it," Palmer says mildly. Now, why didn't Palmer want the Veep knowing about this? So he could find out from someone else? The Veep is pissed about Palmer authorizing a military engagement. Palmer basically says that everyone does it. Remember when everyone thought he was too honest and upstanding to make it as a politician? Guess he got over that. The Veep yells at him, "We marched onto Chinese soil, kidnapped one of their nationals, and in the process the Chinese Consul was killed." Killed is such an ugly word. "We were unlucky, sir," PMHC tries. The Veep laughs mirthlessly, saying that what they did is a good way to start a war. "How am I supposed to fight terrorists while I'm provoking a nuclear superpower?" Veep, you're not supposed to be fighting terrorists. You're supposed to be in Conference Room B, working on your statement to the media. Palmer is supposed to be fighting terrorists. Palmer tells the Veep to calm down: "This is a dirty business, and we're gonna have to get our hands dirty to clean it up." I always want to run away when Palmer says things like that, because it generally means he's going to screw things up even worse. He adds, "You brought me here to help you. Now let me do it." And really, it could have been worse. It's not like Palmer bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade or something. It's 3:24:27.
3:28:54. Lee still isn't dead yet; Palmer is doing what he does best (sitting and staring pensively); the missile continues to vent steam into the Iowa night; and Bitchelle is on the phone without her earpiece. Freaky. Buchanan and Soul Patch have apparently made up, because they're having a cordial if businesslike conversation on the way up to the former DrisCube (now the BitchelleHole). Soul Patch says Lee should be ready to talk soon. Buchanan says he wants everyone ready to instantly work up whatever Lee reveals.
Bitchelle has just gotten off the phone with the Secretary of State, who has authorized the Consulate Cop to come and grill CTU about the raid. Soul Patch is incredulous, but Buchanan recovers more quickly, probably because he already had this conversation with Kiefer before he was supposed to. He lays it out: the Consulate Cop is going to try to prove CTU was behind the raid, and CTU has to prevent him from doing so. "Finding that nuclear warhead is our number one priority." Buchanan orders the Consulate Cop led to the conference room when he arrives, and for all visible screens to be masked. In this place, wouldn't that be…all of them? How's anybody going to get any fake computer work done? Buchanan leaves them alone in the BitchelleHole.
Soul Patch complains to Bitchelle that they shouldn't be diverting resources from finding the warhead. Bitchelle is still holding out hope that they'll be able to turf the Consulate Cop in a hurry. At the moment, they're staring through the glass wall of the BitchelleHole down at the main floor, where DoDder is busy with her file folders. Bitchelle observes, "If we don't get that information from Lee, DoDder's husband will have died for no reason." Soul Patch wonders what DoDder's even doing at CTU after what happened. Bitchelle figures DoDder's trying to keep busy to keep her mind off of things, with a significant "we're not just talking about DoDder any more" look that Soul Patch totally misses. Soul Patch marvels over how quickly Kiefer's relationship with DoDder has gone south. I guess he's not just talking about DoDder any more either. They turn to each other. "I hate being without you," he says. She emotionally says she didn't want it this way. They stare at each other. Oh, you don't have time to defuse an international incident, but you're willing to "divert resources" for this? Naturally, her desk phone rings before they can divert their tongues into each other's esophagi. It's Curtis, with the news that Consulate Cop has arrived. Wow, he got there a lot more quickly than Kiefer did last week. Must not have had a dying guy in the back of his car. Bitchelle directs Curtis to set Consulate Cop up in the conference room, where Kiefer and Buchanan are waiting for him. Curtis wonders if they shouldn't have Consulate Cop more out of sight, but Bitchelle says they have to "give the impression that we have nothing to hide." Because that in itself won't look at all suspicious in an office dedicated to national security. Curtis agrees, and Bitchelle hangs up so she and Soul Patch can be alone with this big awkward thing that's hanging between them now.
Down on the floor, Curtis greets Consulate Cop and his entourage of one, and leads them to the conference room. He arrives in the room seconds after Kiefer comes in the room through the other door. He's back in the suit he was wearing for the first hour and a half of the season. Buchanan introduces himself to Consulate Cop, and identifies Kiefer as being "from the Department of Defense." Kiefer urbanely offers Consulate Cop a seat. Consulate Cop smilingly says he knows of Kiefer, and that they knew Kiefer was in Los Angeles. Kiefer's not so much a secret agent any more, is he? He asks when Kiefer arrived, and Kiefer says he flew in from Washington with DaD a few days ago. Consulate Cop assumes that DaD must be at CTU, since he hasn't been seen the last eight or so episodes. Kiefer says DaD's at District. Is that different from Division? Consulate Cop wonders why Kiefer isn't with DaD, so Kiefer mentions that "As you know, I used to run this office." Consulate Cop goes in for the kill: "So if there's anyone capable of leading a covert operation under short notice, you would be the ideal candidate." Buchanan starts to jump in, but Kiefer pleasantly says he's got it: "I can assure you that neither CTU nor I had anything to do with the terrible events that took place at your Consulate tonight." He looks the Consulate Cop right in the eye as he's speaking, although he doesn't give his word like he usually does.
Consulate Cop smiles right back at Kiefer and hands out some copies of the security camera still of Agent Burn. Kiefer says the photo's been altered, but the Consulate Cop says they ran it through the intelligence database and found a near-perfect match to Agent Burn. Kiefer coolly asks if the Consulate Cop checked it against the database for the People's Freedom Coalition. Every time they mention that group it sounds more like something from The Life of Brian. Consulate Cop points out that the man in the photo isn't Asian. Rather than wasting time regretting the fact that Agent Baker went down in a plane crash over the Pacific, Kiefer points out to poor, naïve Consulate Cop that the PFC uses European mercenaries, "half a dozen of which [sic] are a closer match to this photograph than Agent Burn." Consulate Cop wants to talk to Agent Burn, but Buchanan says Agent Burn isn't in tonight. "Of course," says Consulate Cop with the frustrated smile of a guy who knows he's getting the runaround. Buchanan tries to mollify Consulate Cop, but he goes off on a tear. As he's filibustering, Kiefer just happens to look out through the glass wall behind Consulate Cop. Guess who's ten feet away, chatting up Potato Face? None other than Agent Burn. Kiefer's face goes rigid. As Consulate Cop and Buchanan continue sparring, Kiefer reaches into his pocket and makes his cell phone go off. He pretends to answer it, and talks for a minute before excusing himself out the back door. "I'd like to see the hourlies for Kiefer," Consulate Cop growls at Buchanan. Rather than telling Consulate Cop to fuck off, like he would if he really had nothing to hide, Buchanan says he'll see what he can do.
Potato Face's phone rings. It's Kiefer, on his cell phone in the back hallway. He tells Potato Face to have Agent Burn meet him there immediately and get a chopper ready to go. Potato Face relays the instructions to Burn and then to flight ops over the phone. Both parties comply quickly. Kiefer meets up with Burn and tells him to follow, saying that the security camera at the Consulate caught his face. Burn says that's impossible, since he had his mask on. Well, except for a second there. "Trust me, I saw the freeze frame," says Kiefer. "It was you." Burn babbles excuses, and Kiefer says Burn will have to leave the city in the helicopter he's having prepped. Burn apologizes, but Kiefer doesn't seem too mad at him. "You gotta go," he says. It's 3:35:27. Burn goes.
Kiefer's cell phone rings, for real this time. It's Curtis, who's no longer in the meeting, telling Kiefer that Lee's waking up and Melissa Rabb, the Chinese interpreter, is already there. Kiefer says he'll be right there and heads off to the clinic at a jog. And now I need to apologize to the real Melissa Rabb, who is a 24 viewer and TWoP poster who won an auction to have a character named after her on the show. And then I went and misspelled her name in last week's recap. I should know better than to trust my closed-captioning by now.
In the clinic, Dr. Besson is fussing over Lee. Potato Face and another analyst are right outside the room, sitting at computers and wearing headphones so they can hear every word of Mandarin that Lee utters. Kiefer walks right in behind Rabb to where Besson is treating Lee and says, "Doctor, that's enough. He's mine now. Thank you." Which of those three sentences doesn't belong? Kiefer has Rabb tell Lee he's in critical condition, and that they'll withhold care until Lee answers Kiefer's questions. Rabb tells Lee she likes the way his sheet tents, for all I know, because I don't speak Mandarin. Lee understands. But his story's changed: he suddenly doesn't know where the warhead is. Kiefer gets all bunchy, until Lee says he might know where ImhoTerror is. He knows of three locations where ImhoTerror's working today: The Rocklyn Building ("We know about that one," Kiefer snaps), a "bar downtown" ("We know about that one too"), and a factory on Sixth. "Where on Sixth?" Kiefer asks, relieved that the third place isn't the ImHideout he stormed a few hours ago. Lee says it's on Sixth and Alameda. "That's the one we're looking for," Kiefer says, and on his way out he orders Potato Face to put together a team that includes Curtis. "They need to be ready to move now." Potato Face is on it. They needed two analysts listening in for that? I found that location myself using Yahoo! Maps, and can practically plot a route from the exact spot where I now think CTU is (not that I'm saying until I'm sure). It's 3:37:32.
3:41:53. Bitchelle has her earpiece back in, Buchanan is still catting and mousing with the Consulate Cop, the missile countdown continues, and the Veep paces the Undal Office. On the CTU floor, Curtis tells DoDder that the Consulate Cop wants to talk to her. Why? Because Buchanan had Kiefer's hourlies dummied up to show that Kiefer had been working with DoDder while the raid on the Consulate was going on. "Buchanan wants me to lie to the Chinese government to protect Kiefer?" Curtis says it's to protect the U.S. Government and that Lispy Skip is sending the hourlies to DoDder's system. She says she's not comfortable with it. "I understand," says Curtis, "but whatever you decide, you're still gonna have to talk to Consulate Cop." DoDder pulls up the fake file, which does indeed show her and Kiefer working together on some random data processing task. She looks up to see him coming out onto the floor at 3:43:23, and stomps over to ask what's happening. Kiefer says they're getting ready to move in on ImhoTerror's latest location. But she's referring to the fact that Consulate Cop wants to question her about her "working with" Kiefer. Kiefer says he's sorry, "but whatever Buchanan laid out, you've got to stick to it." DoDder doesn't see what the big deal is now that Lee's given himself up, so Kiefer has to tell her about the Consul's death. "The United States government cannot be held responsible for that." DoDder's had it up to here with this shit. "Kiefer, what are you doing? You have broken every major protocol set by CTU and the DoD and for what? Is any of this working?" Kiefer reminds her of what I've been saying since noon: "You're still alive. Your father's still alive. And we managed to stop all but one of the power plants from melting down. Yes, it's working. And we have to fight to keep it working." He tells her to do what she has to, and says he's gotta go. He means it, too, because you know what? He goes. DoDder considers what Kiefer just said for a moment, and joins the Consulate Cop in the conference room.
But Buchanan's not in there right now; he's out on the floor, being told by Lispy Skip that Kiefer's approach to the latest ImHideout is all set up. Buchanan tells him to make sure Soul Patch has a copy of the plan, since he'll be running point from CTU. Yeah, Buchanan's definitely not mad at Soul Patch any more.
Buchanan reenters the conference room. Consulate Cop is just getting around to Kiefer's hourlies, which show him working on data processing with DoDder between 1:00 AM and 3:00 AM. DoDder confirms it. Consulate Cop asks which analyst they gave the data to. She names Lispy Skip without hesitation. Interesting how the fake hourlies they came up with also cover up Kiefer's raid on the bar, but not the hour he spent trying to figure out how to get away with torturing Prado and then actually torturing him. That should make things interesting time we want to complain to China about its human rights violations. Consulate Cop is skeptical that CTU would waste someone with Kiefer's qualifications on data processing. DoDder babbles smoothly for a minute about Kiefer's experience coming in useful in the course of work he didn't do. Consulate Cop says he's surprised that DoDder was working on the floor, since the clinic logs show her husband was busy dying during the hours she was supposed to be working with Kiefer. If the logs mention that Grayadder died because the doctor was busy treating the guy who was kidnapped from the Consulate instead, the Consulate Cop doesn't appear to notice. He comes right out and accuses her of lying to cover for Kiefer. Buchanan jumps in -- much too late, considering he's the one who screwed up this cover-up so badly, picking the worst possible person in the entire building for Kiefer to have been "working with," short of Grayadder or Lee himself. Consulate Cop says he's not going to "endure half-baked alibis." DoDder says Consulate Cop can believe what he wants, but she has to get back to work. She stomps out of the conference room, pissed off that now the People's Republic of China has an official record that she sucks. Which she does, but not in the way they think.
Exactly two minutes after we last saw Kiefer in his suit, he and Curtis are already on the road and back in their hideout-raiding clothes, with Kiefer at the wheel of the CTUMobile. Palmer calls to get an update on their operation, and reminds Kiefer, "This warhead can detonate at any moment now." Palmer changes the subject to the Consulate Cop, and Kiefer says that CC was still at CTU when they left. "Are we okay there?" Palmer asks pointedly. Kiefer tells Palmer about the photo of Agent Burn, and the story he came up with that "should hold them off for a while." Palmer thanks Kiefer, wishes him good luck, and ends the call. It's 3:47:16. Palmer tells PMHC that he needs to tell the Veep that the Consulate Cop has to leave CTU now. Which is odd, because the Veep specifically gave Palmer power to deal directly with CTU, as opposed to, say, ordering invasions of Chinese territory. PMHC reminds Palmer that the Veep wanted the Consulate Cop to have access. "And he has," says Palmer, but now he has to go. "CTU has to be able to do their job without the added pressure of a cover-up." Have Buchanan tell Consulate Cop that. I'm sure he'll understand. PMHC says he'll see what he can do, and heads into the Undal Office to talk to the Veep.
After the Veep finishes blowing somebody off over the phone, PMHC tells him about Consulate Cop's continued presence at CTU. The Veep's still pissed about the reason that Consulate Cop is there at all, and further complains that kicking the Consulate Cop out of CTU will telegraph guilt and give the Chinese "all the justification they need to escalate this crisis." PMHC, still trying to get himself into the promo, says that unless they find the warhead, "Ten million Americans could face annihilation." "And we could be at war with a billion Chinese," the Veep promos right back. PHMC advises the Veep to "worry about the Americans now and the Chinese later." "Your advice or David Palmer's advice?" the Veep paranoids. "When I agreed to let you bring Palmer in, it wasn't so the two of you could form an alliance against me." The thing about being Vice President is that you have lots of time to watch reality TV. "You and Palmer are running this country while I'm taking phone calls from mid-level staffers." Hey, dude, you asked for this coup. PMHC reads my mind: "Would you like me to ask President Palmer to leave?" PMHC says. That shuts the Veep up. "No," he finally says. "Call CTU. Tell Bill Buchanan to escort Consulate Cop out of the building." But his attitude says there's going to be a reckoning for this later. I reckon. It's 3:49:13.
3:53:38. Bitchelle and her earpiece stalk the CTU floor, Keith Szjootophamiszyl continues the countdown, ImhoTerror and his minion observe remotely via laptop, and Kiefer and Curtis's team arrives and parks in an alley. They get out of the CTUMobile, and Kiefer tells Curtis, "Put Michaels in play now." Over his earpiece, he tells Potato Face that they're getting into position. She can't confirm that ImhoTerror's in the building, but she's detecting a microwave uplink that she can't intercept because it's encrypted. Kiefer says thanks. Curtis asks Kiefer how they're going to confirm ImhoTerror is inside. Kiefer: "We don't. But we're out of time. We move now. Give all teams a go." Jeez, good thing they've got the right building this time. Curtis gives all teams a go. He, Kiefer, and two other agents head around a corner of the building, weapons drawn.
Consulate Cop isn't leaving CTU quietly. He's vowing to return with a "formal order for a more extensive investigation." Buchanan calmly says he understands, which I don't, because I don't know from whom Consulate Cop plans to get this order or how he plans to enforce it. In the meantime, Buchanan suggests that Consulate Cop concentrate on the People's Freedom Coalition. "I'm quite sure they are your perpetrators." God, Buchanan sucks at this. If he really wants to convince Consulate Cop that he knows nothing about Lee's kidnapping, he should be acting like a total stress monkey over not knowing where Lee is. Instead, he's all, "Good luck with your problem," when he's trying to convince Consulate Cop of something that would make Lee's kidnapping Buchanan's problem too. How hard is that? What would be even better is something that a clever viewer suggested to me in an email: blame the terrorists for the kidnapping. Buchanan could say the terrorists took Lee in order to protect themselves before the Americans could question him. As an added benefit, we'd then have (to use the Veep's colorful phrase) "a billion Chinese" looking for ImhoTerror as well. But anyway. Soul Patch pulls Buchanan aside to tell him that Kiefer's at the staging area. Buchanan returns to Consulate Cop and says he needs to get back, and that the Redshirts will escort him from the building. Consulate Cop thanks him and shakes his hand. It's 3:55:05. On his way out, he and his escort pass Lispy Skip, who's just now being flagged down by a woman who says his name. Consulate Cop asks Skip if he's the same Lispy Skip. Skip says yeah, but he's busy, and turns to go. Consulate Cop says he forgot to asks Buchanan one more question: "DoDder mentioned to me that you were helping her earlier with some DoD files." Lispy Skip says, "Yeah, until she was called down to the clinic." Consulate Cop: "So then it was just you and Kiefer?" Skip: "What?" Too late, Potato Face yanks the door behind Skip open and snaps, "Skip, come here." "Thank you," says Consulate Cop.
Back on the floor, Potato Face calls Lispy Skip an idiot and tells him to keep his mouth shut. "I didn't say anything," he protests.
Consulate Cop is walking out again, following the CTU Redshirts. He's already on the phone, saying in Chinese, "The [man] who led the attack on our Consulate was Kiefer. Pull up all his files. I want to look at them when I get back." So China doesn't want a confrontation any more than the U.S. does? I guess Consulate Cop didn't get the memo.
Kiefer peeks around a corner and spots a lone guard standing outside the current ImHideout. He instructs Michaels over his earpiece to "take him out." "Copy that," is the response, followed by a single shot from the nearest rooftop. The guard goes down. Michaels is an efficient fellow. Kiefer and his team sprint towards the now-unguarded building. It's 3:56:13.
Inside the building, ImhoTerror tells Keith Szhittytiming to "Start the sequence." He does, and a text window pops up on Keith's screen saying, "Missile launch in 00:04:00." It starts counting down the seconds. Hey, that's during week's previouslies! No fair! ImhoTerror sees the same thing on his screen. He shuts down the laptop and says, "We're done here." He and his minion get up to leave. He tells the other two guys there to "get the car," although he hangs back himself. Unbeknownst to any of them, Kiefer and his team are already at the outer door. They burst through and take out ImhoTerror's guys in seconds. Once again, ImhoTerror's failure to pick a base of operations without windows has bitten him in the ass. The bar had windows, and that worked out fairly well for him. Why doesn't he learn?
Abruptly outnumbered, ImhoTerror flees back from whence he came. But he's surrounded, cornered, and generally screwed. For reals this time. Curtis flushes ImhoTerror towards the door Kiefer's standing behind. When ImhoTerror makes a break for it, he runs right into Kiefer's gun barrel. "I've been waiting for this," Kiefer breathes. ImhoTerror says, "You're too late," and backs away with a smile, hands raised. Unfortunately for ImhoTerror, Kiefer is no longer the same softie who didn't shoot Saunders at this point last season. Which he proves by shooting ImhoTerror. Just in the arm, though. ImhoTerror goes down. Kiefer gets nice and close and kneels on ImhoTerror's wounded arm. ImhoTerror grunts in pain. "That hurts, doesn't it?" Kiefer says. He's still got his gun in ImhoTerror's face, and he's stroking the muzzle around all over his enemy's head and making these terrifying evil-chipmunk faces that are scarier than anything we've seen ImhoTerror do all season. A freaked-out Curtis reminds Kiefer that "We still need him." Kiefer ignores Curtis. But he doesn't ignore ImhoTerror when he says, "Go ahead, kill me. That won't stop the missile."
Oops. "What are you talking about?" Kiefer demands. Curtis runs over to the laptop that ImhoTerror just shut down, which is now showing a live webcam shot of the missile in Iowa, getting ready for takeoff. "We got a problem," he tells Kiefer. Kiefer tells his guys, "Secure the prisoner," and joins Curtis at the desk. "Oh, my God, they've got a missile," he obviouses. Shot ImhoTerror is lying on the floor and smiling, like, What did I just say? Kiefer tells Curtis to hook his GameBoy up to the laptop so CTU can patch into what it's doing. Soul Patch, who's supposedly been "running point" this whole time back at CTU, finally does something: he asks what's going on. Kiefer tells him about the missile. "How can that be?" Soul Patch asks in confusion. Curtis hits a button on his GameBoy and the missile appears on the CTU big screen. There are less than 52 seconds left. Everyone at CTU scrambles to figure out what to do, but there's no time; the satellite scans aren't working fast enough, and the visual is too general. "A structure…trees," analyses Potato Face, the insanely qualified CTU analyst. Too bad Kiefer wasted all that time forcing ImhoTerror to make out with his gun. ImhoTerror smugly returns Kiefer's stare as the clock counts down to zero, even though it started at four minutes and it's only been three and a half. And the missile streaks into the night sky, no doubt on schedule to hit Los Angeles during the season finale. It's 4:00:00. Supposedly.
week: We might well get a commercial for a ballistic missile defense shield, but there's no indication of that in the preview. Instead, DaD and DiCK are finally back, and Kiefer dodges a rocket-powered grenade. Whee!