3:00 A.M.
Paul's body is wheeled out of the operating room as the doctor works on Lee. Jack goes out to find Audrey crying. He apologizes for what happened. She pushes him away, saying that she can't bear to be near him. Audrey asks Jack to leave.
3:04 A.M.
Heller assures Jack that he did the right thing by putting Lee's life over Paul's.
3:05 A.M.
Novick tells Jack that the Chinese Consul was killed by his own men during the raid. Novick wants Jack to make sure each member of the team has an alibi for the time of the ambush. He and Palmer want to avoid a serious confrontation with China.
3:06 A.M.
Chloe discovers that someone on the outside is trying to jam the CTU satellite servers. She alerts Heller, who hopes it will lead them to McLennan.
3:07 A.M.
One of McLennan's men is unable to jam the CTU satellite because of their new security system that was installed in the last week. McLennan wants to move the schedule up by an hour.
3:08 A.M.
Palmer and Novick decide to construct a plausible scenario for the situation that doesn't involve the U.S. government. Palmer asks Novick to have CTU come up with a list of anti-Chinese factions that have attacked the country's embassies. Although these groups are Asian extremists, Jack's men wore masks and were unidentifiable.
3:09 A.M.
Cheng, the head of security at the Chinese Consulate, goes over the surveillance footage and finds that one of the masked men's faces was briefly revealed. He has the image of the man's face sent to his home country's intelligence databases for identification.
3:10 A.M.
Jack regroups his ambush team and explains the problem with the Chinese Consul. They must all have alibis for the night. Agent Bern is a little uneasy.
3:11 A.M.
McLennan sets up the warhead to be delivered by missile. He believes that the feds will look on land instead of searching for a missile.
-Commercial Break-
3:16 A.M.
Jack tells Chloe that he needs Audrey to authorize Defense Department data sent over. Chloe questions whether it will be awkward for Jack with Audrey now that he let her husband die. She offers to be his sounding board if he ever needs a friend to talk to. Jack looks at Chloe incredulously.
3:17 A.M.
Jack asks Audrey for her DoD clearance, and she inquires about Lee's health. There is tension between them.
The CTU team meets. Their primary goal is to figure out how and where McLennan will set off the nuclear bomb.
3:18 A.M.
Cheng finds a match for the face in the surveillance footage. He gets the file for Agent Bern from CTU in Los Angeles.
3:19 A.M.
Michelle takes a call from Cheng, who wants to come over to meet with her even though CTU is in the middle of a national security crisis. Cheng accuses her agency of raiding the Consulate and kidnapping Lee, which can be construed as an act of war. Michelle doesn't confirm or deny this, and she quickly gets off the phone. Cheng calls the U.S. Secretary of State.
3:21 A.M.
Jack cautiously approaches Audrey and encourages her to go get some rest. Audrey snaps at him.
3:22 A.M.
Heller lets Jack know that Michelle received a call from the Chinese Consulate about the ambush. They claim to have evidence that CTU was involved. Jack wants to dismiss this, but Heller insists that it's vital.
3:23 A.M.
Novick gets a list from CTU of groups that tried to attack Chinese targets. Palmer thinks they can convince China to save face by placing the blame on someone else. President Logan storms in because he just received a call from the Secretary of State about a covert action against the Chinese Consulate. Palmer admits to being the one who sanctioned the attack. Logan is furious that a fragile relationship was tampered with, but Palmer is unapologetic. It was the only course of action that they could have taken. Palmer asks that Logan allow him to do what he was he was brought in for.
-Commercial Break-
3:28 A.M.
Tony tells Heller that Lee is out of surgery. Michelle lets them know that the Secretary of State authorized the head of security from the Chinese Consulate to come to CTU to question them. Heller says that Novick is working on placing the blame with someone else.
3:30 A.M.
Noting Audrey's change of heart toward Jack, Tony tells Michelle that he hates being without her. Michelle opens up and says that she never wanted them to end up this way. They are interrupted by Curtis alerting them to Cheng's arrival.
3:31 A.M.
Heller and Jack greet Cheng in the conference room. Jack has changed into a suit. Cheng recognizes Jack's name and finds it odd when Jack explains that he was kept at CTU for the day. Cheng suggests that Jack is capable of handling a covert operation, and Jack asserts that neither he nor anyone at CTU was responsible for the incident. Cheng pulls out the surveillance image of Bern, and Jack claims that the photo has been altered. He says that their intelligence targeted the People's Freedom Coalition, which has European mercenaries. Cheng asks to speak to Bern and is told he's not working. As Cheng complains, Jack pretends to get a cell call and walks out of the room.
3:34 A.M.
Jack has Chloe get a chopper ready. He tells Bern that the Chinese have a photo of his face, and Bern confesses to his mask being pulled off for a brief second. Jack wants him to leave the city, warning that he may have to answer questions from the Chinese later on.
3:35 A.M.
Lee wakes up and is ready for questioning. Jack runs to the operating room with the translator. Lee says that he doesn't know where the warhead is, but he knows where McLennan might be. McLennan is moving around. Lee lists two locations, but CTU already knows about these. Jack is upset that everything he had to do to get information out of Lee was for nothing. Lee tells Jack that they should be questioning Alexander Trepkos. McLennan worked with Trepkos and Stephen Saunders during their attacks over the years, and he should be in his Los Angeles home at this time. Trusting Lee, Jack has Chloe prepare Curtis and his team to move out to Trepkos's residence.
-Commercial Break-
3:41 A.M.
Curtis lets Audrey know that Cheng wants to question her. The fake hourly reports for Jack list him as working with Audrey at the time of the ambush. Audrey is appalled that her father wants her to lie for Jack, but Curtis says her compliance is really to protect the United States government.
3:43 A.M.
Jack explains to Audrey what happened with the Chinese Consulate. She is frustrated with all the lies and broken protocols, but Jack said that it has helped save her and Heller, as well as stop all but one power plant from melting down. They have to hope that it keeps working.
3:45 A.M.
Audrey tells Cheng that she and Jack worked on data processing with Edgar. Cheng questions why Jack would be brought into CTU only to sit behind a computer. He also notes that the logs show that Paul died during that timeframe, and he believes Audrey was in the clinic with him instead of working with Jack. Audrey doesn't budge, and says that her answer stands.
3:46 A.M.
As he drives with Curtis, Jack gets a call from Palmer. He briefs Palmer on the information they obtained from Lee. Jack also says that Cheng has a photo of one of the CTU agents, but that they feel it is inconclusive.
3:47 A.M.
Palmer has Novick advise the President that Cheng must be removed from CTU because he's slowing them down. Novick thinks he can get Logan to sign off on that.
3:48 A.M.
Novick goes into the President's office and explains the situation with Cheng. Logan feels that to ask Cheng to leave would be to admit complicity, allowing China to escalate the crisis. Novick says that the warhead is the priority, and that they should worry about the lives of Americans first. Logan accuses Novick of forming an alliance with Palmer against him so that the two of them can run the country by themselves. Novick denies this, and asks if he wants Palmer to leave. President Logan caves, and has Heller notified that Cheng should be removed from CTU.
-Commercial Break-
3:53 A.M.
Jack and Curtis pull up to Trepkos's mansion. Jack radios Chloe, but she cannot confirm that anyone is inside because the property is being protected by an encrypted jamming signal. Although they have no confirmation, they are out of time. Jack gives the go ahead for the raid.
3:54 A.M.
On his way out, Cheng tells Heller that he will return in a few days with a formal investigation.
3:55 A.M.
Cheng hears someone address Edgar, and he approaches him. Although Edgar says he is busy, Cheng asks if he was working on DoD files with Audrey. "Yeah, until she was called down to the clinic," Edgar answers. Cheng then asks if he continued working with Jack after she left. Edgar is confused, and Chloe pulls him away. She calls Edgar an idiot for not keeping his mouth shut. Cheng calls the Consulate with news that it was Jack who led the attack.
3:56 A.M.
Jack and the SWAT team move on the mansion. They silently take out the guard at the entrance with a stun dart and climb the gate. However, inside the house, Trepkos receives a security alert. Panicked, he calls his associate Carson to tell him that somehow his illegal activities have been exposed. Carson is stunned, but assures Trepkos that if he sticks to the "plan" and doesn't admit anything, he'll be fine. Trepkos resignedly says he will and hangs up. Jack and the SWAT team barge through the front door, but find Trepkos waiting for them, arms raised.
3:57 A.M.
McLennan orders the sequence to start. As the countdown begins, he smiles.
3:58 A.M.
Chloe informs Tony that she has traced the attempted shutdown of CTU's satellites back to its source and has accessed a live visual feed of the computer. She loads this feed, and both she and Tony are shocked to see a missile about to launch. There is less than a minute left on the countdown. As Jack pats Trepkos down, he receives an urgent call from Heller about the missile. Chloe sends the feed to Jack, but Tony can't trace where the transmission is from or identify the location. Chloe and the team try everything, but the missile fires and leaves its launch pad, carrying the warhead to an unknown location.