Author's note: Another delay but another long one to make up for it. In addition to leaving reviews, there's also a forum I've created for this story. Any questions or comments can also be left there.

24: Day 1.5

Previously in 24: Day 1.5 . . .

ALEXI LENKOVICH fatally wounded Andrei Marenkov and escaped with the apparent location of Marenkov's bomb, leaving his lover and Marenkov's daughter GALINA MARENKOV to be arrested while he escaped to reach his employer. While in custody at the COUNTER TERRORIST UNIT, Galina admitted that Alexi was working for a man named ALAN PAXTON, a former CTU agent believed killed. Marenkov's dying words to CTU agent MATT HARPER were the numbers "seven, one, eight, three, two." While CTU frantically searched for a possible meaning to these numbers, Harper sought out former CTU agent Jack Bauer, who had arrested Paxton for taking bribes, to gain an insight into the man. While he was doing this, Patrick at CTU managed to locate a bank whose coordinates matched Marenkov's numbers. Matt immediately headed out in pursuit, while Alexi and Paxton apparently headed out themselves...

The following takes place between 7:00 P.M. and 8:00 P.M.

7:00:00 . . . 7:00:01 . . . 7:00:02 . . . 7:00:03 . . .

As the helicopter took off from CTU, Matt looked over to McKinley, Baker and the other field agents. "All right, you all have descriptions of Paxton along with Lenkovich. It's very likely we'll run into them at the bank, in which case I want them taken alive. We still need to know who they're working for." Matt leaned over towards the pilot. "What's our ETA?"

"Ten minutes." The pilot answered.

Matt gave the field agents a stern look. "Paxton has to be working as a middle man for someone else. I want to find out who that is."

Mike Novick's gaze shot up as the phone rang.

"Mr. Novick, it's Agent Clark."

"Yeah, Walter. Go ahead."

"I think I may have a lead for you."

Mike nodded. "Glad to hear it. What have you got?"

"I've managed to put a couple of Rudenko's aides with a couple of organizations known for of backing Alexi Lenkovich and others like him. It's not a direct link but it does cast suspicion on Rudenko."

Mike raised an eyebrow. "So President Petrov was right. Good work, Walter."

"There's more." Clark continued, solemnly. "I've managed to link a few of Petrov's people to those same groups. I don't think either man is completely innocent in this matter. Whether either of them actually knew the extent of what's going on remains to be seen. I still have a couple of friends in the Kremlin, a couple of which deal directly with the President. I'm gonna call in some favors from them..."

"Keep at it. We've got enough to deal with without our allies collaborating against us"

Clark sighed. "Agreed."

7:09:11 . . . 7:09:12 . . . 7:09:13 . . . 7:09:14 . . .

The moment the helicopter touched down, Matt was out with McKinley and Baker close behind. Entering the bank, they saw Eric Jackson, another field agent, watching intently over a middle-aged balding man, the bank's manager, along with a uniformed back security guard. They'd managed to catch a break and shown up on a day when the manager was working late. From the sulking look the guard was giving Jackson, Matt suspected Jackson had been forced to strong-arm the man a bit to get him to cooperate.

Jackson stepped out from behind a teller's table where the other two were standing to greet Matt and the other agents. His close-cropped hair, lean build, and hardened featured belied the friendly look he gave Matt when he saw him.

"Agent Harper, this is Mr. Henry Towns." he said, gesturing to the manager.

Matt pulled a computer pad out of his pocket. Pressing a few buttons, an image of the late General Andrei Marenkov appeared on the screen. "Mr. Towns, have you had any dealings with this man?"

Towns studied the image for a moment, then looked up nervously. "Yes, he was in here yesterday; Mr. Mikel Rozhenko. He had an item stored in one of our safety deposit boxes. It was some sort of data device as I recall. A rather strange thing to put in a safety deposit box, if you ask me."

Matt nodded. "Mr. Towns, we need you to open that box for us."

Towns started towards the vault, looking very confused. "Of course. Do you mind my asking what this is all about? Has he done something wrong?"

Matt sighed. "Not exactly, but I can tell you that what's on that device may be vital to national security. The man you were dealing with was not he said he was. He's dead now and that device may be the only source left to some vital information he was possessing."

Towns continued towards the vault, his demeanor appearing even more nervous

Inside the vault, Towns pulled out a large cylindrical key from his coat pocked. Inserting it in the slot in a terminal on the wall, he turned it as he punched something in on a keypad.

"We've recently added a new security procedure for high-value deposit boxes like the one he was using. Access to these boxes requires both the key and a password. Mr. Rozhenko... or whoever he was, chose it. We were the only two who knew it."

As soon as Towns had finished entering the password, a short dull buzzing noise emerged from the terminal, while the words ACCESS DENIED appeared on the screen.

Towns frowned and re-entered the password. The buzzing noise sounded again. "That's odd. The password doesn't seem to be working."

Matt narrowed his eyes and looked at Towns. "What? Are you sure you're entering the right password?"

"I'm positive. When the password is chosen, the computer requires double confirmation of the password to prevent any mistakes. I assured you, I'm putting in the right password for his box."

Matt headed over the door of the vault and leaned out until he could see McKinley.

"We're having a problem with the vault security system. You'd better get Sanchez in here."

"Right." McKinley called back.

Matt stared back at the terminal with frustration, wondering if someone else had left some surprise for them.

7:22:31 . . . 7:22:32 . . . 7:22:33 . . . 7:22:34 . . .

As Agent Nikolai Torumov paced the hallways of CTU, he never thought he'd actually miss infiltrating Alexi's inner circle. At least there I was doing some good. He was gratified he'd been able to save Agent Harper and his son, but that had soon given way to tedium and frustration.

So far Harper had proven himself competent enough but the conduct of his colleagues toward Nikolai was baffling. He'd infiltrated Alexi's organization for nearly two years. He'd seen Alexi commit despicable acts, such as ordering Marenkov to murder his driver, and slitting that young programmer's throat. He'd been disgusted by what he'd seen but managed to hide it by reminding himself of the greater good. Now it seemed everyone else had forgotten that.

They wouldn't even know Alexi had been trying to get a nuclear weapon if it wasn't for him. They should be debriefing him as thoroughly as possible Instead that fool Mason has had we waiting out here like a schoolboy being punished.

Nikolai was almost relieved to have his train of thought interrupted when his phone rang. That changed, however, as soon as he heard the voice on the other end.

"Nikolai, I hope you haven't forgotten us." Agent Natalya Tenyakova said.

"I have not, despite my best efforts." Nikolai sneered.

"I suggest you find a different tone, Nikolai." His FSB counterpart retorted. "You are to report back to our Los Angeles office immediately. Our superiors have decided you've been a guest of CTU long enough."

"What about Galina Marenkov? She's still in custody here."

"That will be settled between our office and theirs. It is no longer any concern of yours. If I were you, I would be more concerned with explaining your failure to follow orders."

"You mean your orders to do nothing while your man planned to kill Marenkov and a CTU agent?" Nikolai hissed. "Marenkov's blood is your hands."

"Marenkov was a traitor and an arms dealer. I will lose no sleep over him."

"It was my job to bring both him and Alexi in alive. If not for what you have done, Marenkov would be telling us where his weapons cache is right now and we would not need to worry about it falling into the hands of Alexi or some terrorist. Can you still sleep with that?"

There was a brief pause. "Just get back here now." she answered curtly before hanging up.

The slight satisfaction Nikolai felt at making his point soon gave way to concern as he assessed his situation. Somebody was going to have to pay for the embarrassment their office had suffered today and unfortunately Natalya likely wasn't going to be that someone. Not as long as she had him as a scapegoat.

My career is over, he thought. Ultimately, saving a child, two years of undercover work and nearly fifteen years of loyal service to his agency meant very little when someone was required to take the blame. For some reason, he was reminded of something he'd once heard an American man say years ago: "No good deed goes unpunished."

If today is any indication, that's all too true.

7:31:40 . . . 7:31:41 . . . 7:31:42 . . . 7:31:43 . . .

Agent Hector Sanchez frowned in thought as he looked at the terminal, while Matt, McKinley, Baker, and Towns looked on.

"Yeah, somebody's done some major reprogramming to this system. They've actually managed to encrypt access to Marenkov's deposit. Fairly recently too; couldn't be more than seven or eight hours ago." Sanchez punched in a few more keys on the pad. "I think we might be able to– whoa!" Sanchez instinctively recoiled back as the screen suddenly went dark. A moment later text appeared on the screen reading 'GALINA WILL KNOW THE CODE'

Sanchez squinted in confusion at the screen while Baker looked over at Matt. "Galina? Galina Marenkov? Did she encrypt the system?"

Matt shook his head. "I don't think so. There's nothing in her background that indicates she's capable of something like this. And if she had access to the vault, Alexi Lenkovich would already have the contents." He looked around at the other agents. "It must have been her father."

"What do you mean?" McKinley asked.

"If this was where Andrei Marenkov was hiding his information, it makes sense that he'd have someone watching over it until he turned it over to us. He probably had one of his people work here as an employee." He turned to Towns. "How many new people have you hired in the last few days or weeks?"

Towns paused a moment, then looked up at him. "Nine, but only seven of them have access to the vault and only five of those were working today."

"One of them must have been working for Marenkov." Matt looked down for a moment in thought. "Everything he did in the last few hours of his life was about trying to save his daughter when he thought she was in danger. If CTU managed to get hold of him first, he wouldn't have been able to do that. He must have called his contact at the bank and have them encrypt access to his deposit at some point after Alexi contacted him. It must have been a sort of failsafe, to make sure we'd have to rescue his daughter if we managed to catch him first."

"In the end, it was pointless." Baker shook his head solemnly. "He never knew his daughter was working for Alexi."

"So what now?" McKinley asked. "Do we bring in the bank employees, find out which one of them encrypted the system?"

Matt shook his head. "Whoever did it is probably long gone by now, and we don't have time to look for them or to try to break through these locks. Our only chance now is to do what the message says: Get the code from Galina."

"You really think we can trust her?" Baker asked.

"I think she's had a wake up call since she saw her father get murdered." Matt said. "In any case, we don't have a choice. Alexi Lenkovich or Alan Paxton are probably still after what's in that deposit box and rather take away their reason to be here."

Baker looked at Matt with surprise. "You really think they'd try to hit the bank while we're here? That'd be a pretty big risk."

"Well this," Matt said, point his thumb at the vault, "is a pretty big reward. Big enough that they've killed a lot of agents today to get it already; and big enough that the people they're working for probably won't tolerate them coming back empty-handed."

The other agents nodded as Matt picked up his phone. "George?" He said. "You're not going to believe this."

7:38:16 . . . 7:38:17 . . . 7:38:18 . . . 7:38:19 . . .

Nikolai rushed over to George and Tony. "What's going on?" He said. "I just heard you're moving Galina Marenkov?"

Tony sighed. "We've found her father's information at a bank but somehow he managed to encrypt access to his deposit box. We think she might know the code." George shot Tony a look of disapproval. Clearly he wasn't as eager to volunteer information

Nikolai raised an eyebrow. "And you think you can just trust her to cooperate?"

George sighed impatiently. "Well right now, we don't exactly have a whole lot of options and last time I checked we didn't need to run decisions by you anyway."

"Perhaps not, but I'm coming with you."

"Your boss just tried to have one of by people killed and was partly responsible for the death of Andrei Marenkov. If you think I'm letting anyone from your office into the field with my men or Galina--"

"Agent Tenyakova's actions were not authorized and my superiors will discipline her accordingly. In any event, being an accomplice of Alexi Lenkovich, Galina is accessory to crimes against the Russian people. If you are taking her into the field, I will be coming along to ensure her safety. Unless you would rather I told my superiors you have refused me, in which case they would soon be speaking to your superiors."

Nikolai was a good liar. It was an essential trait in undercover work. Bluffs on the other hand were a risk, no matter how good a liar someone was. Nikolai felt confident enough that he knew this man. This Mason is a bureaucrat. And no bureaucrat wants to be at the center of such a fiasco.

George rolled his eyes and Nikolai resisted the urge to smile. "The chopper leaves in five minutes, with or without you."

Nikolai steeled himself. "I want a moment to speak to her as well." He was pushing his luck, but since he had nothing to lose, it didn't seem to matter.

Again, George's eyes rolled. "Two minutes, and Agent Almeida here's in the room with you."

Nikolai gave the most ambivalent-looking shrug he could come up with. "Fine."

Galina's look of indifference when she saw Tony walk in was replaced with one of surprise when she saw Nikolai follow him.

"Dimitri? So now you have changed sides as well?"

Nikolai's face remained impassive. "I was never on your side to begin with. My name is Agent Nikolai Torumov of FSB. My job was to infiltrate Alexi's organization and learn all I could about his operation."

Galina gave him a neutral stare.

Nikolai sighed. "You're being moved. We've found the bank where your father kept the location of the bomb, but he managed to encrypt access to his deposit box. We think you may know the code so you being taken there to access it before Alexi and Paxton have a chance to get at it"

"Is that so?"

Nikolai raised an eyebrow. "You have a problem with that?"

Galina crossed her legs, straightened her skirt, and continued to stare. "Clearly I have no choice so what does it matter what I think?"

Tony folded his arms. "It matters because the possibility of you betraying us to Alexi is something we have to consider."

Galina turned her gaze to Tony, then back to Nikolai. "Then let me reassure you. As much as I hated my father, I never wanted him dead. So any opportunity to hurt Alexi is one I will take. Does that make you feel better?"

"We'll see." Nikolai answered, pulling her up firmly by the arm. "Come on. The helicopter should be ready."

7:44:51 . . . 7:44:52 . . . 7:44:53 . . . 7:44:54 . . .

At the back of the van, Alexi stared over at Willem in the passenger seat. "Frankly, with so many men, I wonder why Paxton bothered to bring me along" He gestured to the nine other heavily- armed men in the van, then at the van in front of them, which carried another ten.

Willem turned around to Alexi. "CTU's probably crawling over that bank by now. We're going to need every man we can get." The taller man gave Alexi a smile that was anything but comforting. "Besides, Paxton wanted to keep an eye on you."

Alexi responded with a glare.

7:49:34 . . . 7:49:35 . . . 7:49:36 . . . 7:49:37 . . .

Matt, McKinley, and Baker, rushed out as the helicopter touched down. As Galina and Nikolai stepped out, they were rushed into the bank. "Come on, we'd better hurry." As they headed through the hall, he turned to Agent Jackson. "I want those two escorted out of here." He said, gesturing to Towns and the bank guard.

"Wait a minute!" Towns called out. "You don't think there's going to a be shoot-out or something here, do you?"

Matt sighed. "Mr. Towns, I don't know what's going to happen, but I'd feel better if you were a safe distance from here."

Matt and the two Russians hurried down the hallway, and into the vault where Agent Sanchez was already waiting. "All right, what have you got for me?" Sanchez asked.

Matt looked at Galina. "Come on, we don't have much time."

Galina stared at the terminal, then at Sanchez. "Try this: seven, one, eight, three, two."

Matt shook his head. "No, that was the coordinates for the bank on the old mapping system your father used. It doesn't mean anything else."

Galina gave Matt an impatient look. "It was also an old clearance code from early in his army career. My father was slightly superstitious. He thought it was good luck and looked for opportunities to use it. That's probably why he picked this bank."

Matt turned back to Sanchez, who shrugged and entered the code.

A buzzing sound emerged, and for a second, Matt thought that Marenkov had left some other surprise in the system, like a bomb. Fortunately, one of the smaller deposit boxes slid out from the wall and opened. So that's what Marenkov meant when he said those numbers, Matt thought.

The four looked over and saw a digital device inside. So it's finally over, Matt thought.

Sanchez looked at Matt. "Should I try to access the data here?"

Matt shook his head. "No, we'd better wait until we get it back to CTU. They're better equipped to--" The end of his sentence was drowned out and a thunder of gunfire erupted from down the hall, interrupted briefly by cries of pain.

"Get down!" Matt yelled, grabbing the device as the four of them ducked behind a wall. "McKinley, come in!" Matt yelled into his communicator. "What's happening?"

"We've got at least a dozen heavily-armed hostiles!" McKinley's voice responded. "Connelly and Parker are dead. They've got us pinned down behind the desks. We're keeping them from advancing on your position but I don't know how much longer we can hold them off. I've already called for back-up but they may not get here in time."

"Understood." Matt answered before looking up at the others. "We've got to get out of here."

Sanchez looked over at the vault door. "There's a fire exit at the back."

Matt nodded. "I know, but they probably have people waiting in case someone runs out."

"What about closing the vault door and sealing ourselves in until help comes?" Nikolai asked.

"If I were them, I would've brought something to blast open the vault door in case someone tried that." Matt said. "We can't count on that. We'll go for the fire door and clear any hostiles." He slapped the device into Nikolai's hand. "If any hostiles reach you first, shoot the device. At least they won't get what they came for."

Nikolai nodded solemnly as Matt and Sanchez headed out of the vault and down the hallway, before looking back at Galina.

"It's very likely Alexi will get what he came here for, no matter what we do, but I've sacrificed too much to let him win now. So I need to know how truthful you were with me earlier. How far will you go to stop him?"

Galina stared back at him with suspicion.

Matt crept up to the hall corner just close enough to see two men standing near the door. Damn, he thought, they must have blown open the back door.

Looking over at Sanchez for a moment, he quietly conveyed an attack move with his hands until Sanchez nodded in acknowledgment. A moment later, the two agents dove around the corner, guns firing. The two thugs went down instantly.

Their victory was short-lived however. A hail of bullets from the side caught Sanchez in the head. He was dead before he hit the ground.

Matt spun around to see Alexi, one hand on an Uzi directed at Matt, another gripping the bank manager Henry Towns. "Hello again, Agent Harper." Alexi sneered. "Drop your weapon."

At the end of the hallway, Matt saw the bodies of the bank guard and Agent Jackson, both probably having died trying to protect the manager. Matt didn't move, keeping his gun trained on the man. "Let him go, Alexi!"

Alexi slowly turned his weapon towards his hostage, pressing the barrel against Towns' head, Towns winced in pain and fear, his breathing heavy. "You know I'll do it." Alexi hissed.

Matt gritted his teeth in realization that this was true. Slowly Matt crouched down, placing his sidearm on the floor.

Alexi gestured to a supply room off to Matt's side. "Into the closet, now!" He barked.

The moment Matt stepped into the room, Alexi pushed the door shut. From inside, Matt could hear him ordering Towns to pick up Matt's gun and place it through the handle loop, blocking the door shut.

"Thank you for co-operation, Agent Harper!" Alexi called out through the door. "Do svidanya!" A second later, he heard a shot, followed quickly by Towns' death scream.

"Nooooo!" Matt screamed as he heard Alexi's footsteps hurry off in the direction of the vault.

Matt frantically looked around the supply room for something to force the door open. His eyes darted around the room until the came to rest on a fire extinguisher.

The second he heard screaming from the back end of the hallway, Nikolai set the device on the floor, pressed his gun against it, and squeezed the trigger twice.

A moment later Alexi rushed in, immediately training his gun on Nikolai and Galina.

"Well, I certainly did not expect to find the two of you here. It is a welcome surprise however. Drop the gun."

Nikolai slowly set his gun next to the damaged data device. "You're too late. I've destroyed the drive and any information Marenkov had in it. It doesn't matter what you do now."

Before Alexi could respond, Galina grabbed both the device and gun, training the latter on Nikolai as she stood up.

"He's lying, Alexi." She said, staring at him. "You can still recovered the data with the right equipment. We can still do this."

Alexi kept his gun trained on her. "You were the one telling me this venture was to dangerous, now you say we should finish it?"

Galina's gaze never wavered. "It was dangerous. But now we have what we were trying to get. We should take this opportunity while we have it."

Nikolai glared up at Galina. "So after all your promises, you show your true colors. You're as bad as he is."

Alexi squinted his eyes in suspicion. "You were working with them. Why should I trust anything you say?"

Galina looked at Alexi for a moment in silence, then turned back to Nikolai. She looked at the crouching agent for moment, apparently contemplating something... then squeezed off two rounds into Nikolai's back.

Crouching behind one of the teller's desk, several mercenaries flanking him, the realization of his situation quietly passed through Paxton's mind. He'd been in numerous situations similar to this, but on this other side. He recognized McKinley, Baker, and few others still getting off shots. A year and a half ago, the idea of firing mercilessly on his fellow agents, most of which he knew personally would have been unthinkable. It didn't change his motivation in the least, but the irony wasn't lost on him.

What did concern him was how long he could hold out. Though his people outnumbered the CTU team at least two to one, it was clear the agents were the superior soldiers, having taken out half the mercenaries already. Plus there's no doubt that they have back-up already on the way.

Just as this troubling revelation came to him, a crackling voice emerged through the radio. "This is Alexi. I have the data. Repeat; I have the data."

Paxton wasted no time. "Everyone fall back to the first positions, now!" He yelled, jumping up and heading towards the vans.

With one final strike of the fire extinguisher, the door finally cracked open. Picking up his fallen weapon he rushed back to back to the vault. The only person left was Nikolai, slumped in a growing pool of his own blood.

He was still breathing, barely. Matt tried not to think about the similarities to the other Russian he'd seen die three hours earlier.

"This is Harper, I have a man down! I need medical assistance now!" He yelled into his radio before looking down at Nikolai and gripping his hand. "Hang on. Just hang on. We'll find them, I promise you."

"Nyet." Nikolai rasped. "It's all right. I told her to this."

You told Galina to shoot you? The idea was too unbelievable for Matt to even say. "What? What are you talking about?"

"It was the only way for her to gain Alexi's trust. I destroyed the device first. It will take them hours to recover the data. By then she'll have led you straight to him and Paxton..."

Before Matt could get a word in, Nikolai slumped to the floor and lay still.

As the last of the mercenaries piled into one of the vans, Paxton and Willem glared as they saw Alexi rushing towards the van with a woman in tow.

"Who the hell is this?" Paxton asked coldly.

"A friend." Alexi answered climbing into the back of the van. "I'll explain on the way, but we have to go now!"

The climbed in and the van sped off. Alexi didn't notice that Galina never took her eyes off him for a second.

"Mr. President." Mike said, rushing into the Oval Office.

President Palmer looked up. "Mike, good. Is there any news yet on CTU's search for the weapons data?"

Mike shook his head. "Not yet, but there's something else. We just got an intelligence report from Moscow. Leonid Rudenko, the Russian Prime Minister; he's dead. We don't know the details yet but the initial report points to him being assassinated."

Palmer leaned back in his chair, too stunned to speak.

7:59:57 . . . 7:59:58 . . . 7:59:59 . . . 8:00:00 . . .

NEXT: While Galina tries to keep close to Alexi and avoid Paxton's suspicions, Palmer and Mike face a political dilemma when they trace the Prime Minister's assassination back to it's source.