7:00pm to 8:00pm
A ragged-looking man sat alone in darkness. His hair was a dark, greasy brown colour, and he had obviously not shaved for more than a few days. Barely visible on the desk in front of him were several folders, binders and loose papers. He seemed to be staring at them, but in fact was completely lost in thought, not giving the documents the slightest bit of attention. He lit a cigarette, and what little light there was became hazed in a white cloud of smoke.
Suddenly, the ringing of a phone cut through the silence. In no particular rush, the man took the phone out of his pocket and answered it.
"Yes?" he said hoarsely.
"They have him," came a voice on the other end of the line. "We will move into position now and prepare to strike in fifteen minutes."
"Thank you," the man replied, and hung up. He placed the phone on his desk and picked up one of the folders. The seal on the front of it read 'COUNTER TERRORIST UNIT'. From it he took some photographs and started flipping through them. He stopped when he came to the one he was looking for. The photograph showed himself, standing with Jack and two other men.
"Today, Bauer," he croaked as he squinted at the picture in the dim light. "Today you pay."
Jack sat cuffed in the back of a squad car. Sergeant Jarrett was driving and Officer Roland sat in the shotgun seat.
"I'm telling you, I'm innocent," Jack said to them for the hundredth time.
"Quiet, Bauer," Roland snapped. He had been very irritated with Jack for the whole ride, because of Jack trying to take him hostage.
"Just let me talk to my boss, Gary Jennings," he requested. "He'll help me find out what this is all about. I think someone's trying to set me up."
"Do you know how many people have sat in the back of this car and said that?" Jarrett said with a chuckle. "Granted, none of them were federal agents, but the outcome was always the same; they were lying. So do yourself a favour and wait to speak to an attorney."
Jack fell into silence. There was nothing he could do here, he would have to wait until they got to the station to sort this mess out, if he could.
Karsen's van arrived at an apartment building. Karsen and his two henchmen got out and the van drove away. The three of them entered the building and took the elevator up to a high floor. They then entered an apartment that was well furnished, and was clearly lived in.
"Good thing we got here so soon, I was almost out of battery," Karsen said with a laugh. He plugged his laptop into a wall socket, turned it back on, and set it down on a coffee table.
"You want a beer?" one of the other men asked as he walked towards the kitchen.
"No, thank you," Karsen replied with distain. "And you'll both stick to one. We're not paying you two to sit around drinking."
"What about some chips?" he called from the next room.
"It may have escaped your notice, but I have an important job to do," Karsen snapped. "Anyway, how would you like me to tell Burton what you were doing on his time?"
The henchman returned with two beers and a large pack of potato chips, but said nothing else.
Karsen turned his attention back to his computer. He spent some time reviewing various bank transfers, all the while his henchmen sat silently on the couch. One of the men opened the bag of potato chips and started eating them. Karsen winced at the loud crunches, incredibly irritated. He drew his silenced gun, turned away from the computer and plugged two bullets into the man who had been eating. He then pointed his gun at the one remaining man.
"Do something with the body, would you? Thanks," he said cheerfully.
The henchman dragged the body out of the room, and Karsen went back to his laptop. He closed the bank statements, and then opened up a webcam feed. It showed a middle-aged woman and two boys, one in his early teens and the other no older than eight. They were all bound and gagged.
"Good to see his family is okay," Karsen said to himself.
When they got to the station, Jack was led into an interrogation room. They put him in a chair, and Sergeant Jarrett sat in a chair on the opposite side of a table. There was a large one-way mirror behind Jarrett, the kind that Jack had seen every day in the CTU interrogation room.
"Well, well," Jarrett said in a very arrogant tone. "We've got a bit more information on you, Jack. Seems you've been selling classified information."
"What?" Jack said, completely stunned. How could they think he would do something like that?
"It's all right here," Jarrett said, holding a government file in his hands. "It says you've been selling structural information, personnel files, access codes, everything."
"That's crazy," Jack said calmly. "I would never do that. Take a look at my service record. You'll see I'm not that sort of agent."
"Oh I have looked at it," Jarrett replied, taking out another file. "Most of it is very impressive. But on the other hand…you were removed as head of the CTU Domestic Unit after you were thought to be in league with the terrorists trying to assassinate Palmer. You were inactive for over a year in order to deal with a crisis in your personal life."
Jack stared incredulously at Jarrett. He couldn't believe this man was twisting everything he had done for his country to try to make him fit the profile of a traitor.
"This is bull," Jack said in frustration. "I am not a double agent."
"Seems to make sense to me," Jarrett said levelly. "Do you know what this record tells me? It tells me that you were willing to sacrifice everything for this country, but a good deed never goes unpunished. You saved Palmer, and not only did you get fired but your wife was killed. It doesn't take too much imagination to see why you snapped, why you decided you wouldn't take it anymore."
Jack said nothing. He stared at the handcuffs on his wrists, not believing that it had come to this.
"Please," Jack said, his voice sounding hollow and defeated. "Please just call Gary Jennings."
Jarrett gave Jack a pitiful look that made Jack want to tear the man's chest open. "Okay Jack. Feldman!" he called into the mirror. "Get Jack's boss on the phone."
They sat for a few moments, but there was no reply.
"Feldman?" Jarrett repeated. He took out his radio. "Feldman, do you copy?" There was still no answer. "Feldman? McAvoy? Roland? Does anyone copy?"
After another long silence, a voice could be heard over Jarrett's radio. "This is Roland," he said, but he sounded panicked and out of breath. "Feldman and McAvoy are both dead. I don't know about anyone else in the station."
"What happened?" Jarrett demanded.
"Armed men came and shot them both, I've got two on my tail."
"How many men are there?" Jarrett asked, drawing his own gun and eying the door.
"I've counted five," Roland replied. "But there could be more of them. I'm trying to draw them all towards --" Two shots were heard over the radio, then it went silent.
Jarrett bowed his head gravely.
"I'm sorry about Roland and the others," Jack said. "But you can't hold these guys off by yourself."
"Do you think I'm gonna let you help me, Jack?" Jarrett commented. "You're still in custody."
"I give you my word that I've done nothing wrong," Jack said firmly. "I think this whole thing was set up to get me into the open and come after me. You need my help, release me if you want to live."
Jarrett considered it, then unlocked Jack's handcuffs and handed him a gun. "I don't like this, but I don't have a choice," he said.
"Roland said that there were at least five," Jack said. "He also said only two of them were after him, so the rest must have split up. What's the shortest and most direct way out of this station?"
"There's a fire exit on the other side of the holding cells," Jarrett replied.
Jack walked to the side of the door, pointed his gun outwards, and nodded at Jarrett to open it. Jarrett did so with Jack covering him. There was nobody outside the door. The two of them continued in this formation along the corridor until they reached the holding cells. There were at least twenty people in the cells, most of them well-built men.
"Hey!" One of the men shouted. "Those men that just ran by must be looking for these pigs! They're by the cells!" he yelled, loud enough to be heard throughout the station.
Jack was tempted to shoot the man just to shut him up, but he knew the damage had already been done. He and Jarrett ran full-pelt to the exit, but two of the men caught up with them. One of them shoved Jarrett up against the bars of the cells, where the prisoners on the other side held his arms there. The other of them tried to grab Jack's gun, but Jack punched the man away, and once he had regained his composure, he shot the man twice in the chest.
Meanwhile, the first attacker had pulled Jarrett's keys out of his pocket and took his gun while he was held in place. The man pointed his gun at the prisoners nearest the cell door.
"Back away from the door and I'll make it worth your while!" he barked at them. They moved away, and the man unlocked the door. He then threw Jarrett into the cell, where all of the prisoners started to beat the policeman suddenly locked in with them.
Jack shot him in the head, and he fell to the floor. The men in the cell were cheering as they pounded Jarrett.
"He's dead!" one of them cried victoriously.
"Dammit," Jack muttered as he continued to run towards the exit. He reached the door and ran out of it. A shot narrowly avoided him, and Jack realised that more men were pursuing him. He ran into the parking lot, but did not know what he was planning to do. He had no keys to any of the cars, and his own car was back at the crime scene.
Several more men ran out of the station after him, and a car swerved around and started to come after Jack too. The driver started to fire through his windshield, but the bullets missed and Jack was able to fire back. Jack, on the other hand, did not miss and the man fell forwards in his seat as the car rolled to a stop.
Still avoiding bullets being shot by the hostiles, Jack shot through the car window and was able to open the door. He pulled the dead driver out and got in. He drove away, but the men chasing him got into a car of their own.
Jack drove down the street as fast as he could, trying to shake them off but he couldn't. Suddenly, another car drove out in front of him, cutting him off. He tried to reverse but the car behind him made it impossible. Jack got out of the car, but the two men in the front seats of the car in front of him were both pointing guns at him.
"Don't move, Bauer," one of them said.
The two men in the car behind him were also aiming their guns at him. Jack realised that the men knew his name, which confirmed in his head that this was a personal attack. Knowing that shooting any of the men would not help him, since there would still be another three men ready to shoot, he dropped his gun to the ground. The men instantly advanced on him, and one of them hit him hard on the back of the head, knocking him out.
Jennings sat in his office in CTU when his intercom rang.
"Jennings," he answered.
"It's Rouse," Adrian answered.
"Is this about Jack?"
"Yeah, kinda," Adrian replied. "I was trying to get through to LAPD again, and instead of stalling me, the line went dead completely. Now I don't know if that means they're getting more impatient with me and just hung up, or something else."
"You think something might've happened at LAPD?" Jennings asked.
"I dunno, maybe. What do you want me to do?"
Jennings thought for a second. "Dispatch a field agent to LAPD to find out what's going on."
"Just one agent?" Adrian repeated. "If there are hostiles at LAPD headquarters I doubt one agent could handle that."
"But I hardly think it's anything that serious. Like you said, I'm sure they just hung up on you. Send one agent." Jennings ended the call.
Adrian paused before pressing the intercom again. "Dispatch," he said slowly. "I need you to send two field agents to LAPD down town."
"Will do," the person on the other end said.
"And," he hesitated again. "Make sure they report straight back to me on channel nine."
"Okay," the dispatch agent said.
They hung up. Adrian felt slightly silly, one extra agent was not going to make much difference. But if Jack Bauer was in trouble, he wanted to know that he had done what he could to help.
Dr. Oberman read President Palmer's blood pressure.
"I don't like this," he said plainly. "Your blood pressure is high, too high."
"Maybe it's the stress of running the most powerful country in the world," Palmer replied with a smile at the corner of his mouth.
"In part, yes," Dr. Oberman said humourlessly. "Without doing a full work-up on you, I can't say for sure, but I'd say there were still traces of the toxin in your system. I would recommend you taking some more time off."
"Out of the question," Palmer said.
"Mr. President," Dr. Oberman said cautiously. "I don't think your cabinet would be pleased to hear the condition you're in, and the fact that you refuse to take medical advise and spend some time relaxing."
"Well I'm sorry if I'm not in the mood for a weekend at the beach," Palmer shot back.
"What I suggest would be considerably more than a weekend, sir," Dr. Oberman said.
"Do you intend to inform my cabinet as to the state of my health?" Palmer asked him.
"No sir," Dr. Oberman said. "It's not my place. But please, sir, I urge you to take my advice and take an extended leave from the Presidency."
Palmer looked at his doctor for a while. "Your concerns will be taken into account," he said. But he didn't mean it. Nobody was going to make him relinquish command of the country again.
Jack came to as one of the men who had attacked them hoisted him onto his shoulders. Jack did not make any movements to let them know he was conscious. The man carried him towards a black car parked outside the building. When they were approaching the parking space, Jack hit the man hard in the head with his elbow. The man did not go down, but in his pain let go of Jack, who slipped down onto his feet. The other four men ran to him, and Jack was able to punch and kick a few of them before they had a secure hold of him again. When they took him back to the car, Jack feigned a struggle, but managed to kick the taillight and shatter it. The men threw him roughly into the back of the car, and two of them got in it. The other three got into a car parked nearby.
He said nothing as they started to drive. They were clearly going to take him to the person really behind this plan.
As Karsen continued tapping on his keyboard, his phone rang yet again. He checked the caller ID and rolled his eyes.
"What is it now?" he asked immediately as he answered.
"I'm waiting, dammit," the ragged man said gruffly. "And I've been waiting for too long."
"Calm down," Karsen said impatiently. "It's been barely, what, an hour and a half since you last called me."
"I wasn't talking about how long I've been waiting today."
"I know, but like I told you before, my manpower is limited. The last thing we need right now is to draw attention to ourselves," Karsen told the man. "I'm afraid everything is happening as fast as possible, but you have to understand that this is not all about you. We have a higher goal to achieve than satisfying your revenge."
"But you still need my information, and if you want to get it I want him delivered to me now."
"I haven't heard from my men yet, but I'm sure they have him already and he's on his way to you now," Karsen said, barely able to keep the rage out of his voice over this man's selfish attitude. "I hope you know what's at stake here, and I can't afford to have you jeopardising everything just because you can't wait an extra ten minutes to kill a man."
"I'm not in a rush to kill him," the man said, and Karsen could hear even over the phone that the man currently had a fiendish grin on his face. "In fact I plan to take my time, I want to make him suffer, to give him a taste of what I have felt because of him."
"Whatever," Karsen dismissed. "I don't care what you do to this guy, all I care about is my pay check. And it should be sizable enough to compensate me for all the risks and sacrifices I've made for this operation."
"You act like this is some noble task you're doing," the man said with mild disgust. "Nobody made you become a double agent. Someone dangles a couple million in your face and you turned traitor. But hey, I'm not judging you."
"I should hope not," Karsen sneered. "After all, you know a thing or two about turning traitor."
"And I paid the price for it. Incidentally, when am I seeing some of this money?"
"It will be wired to you once you provide the information as we discussed. Besides, the bulk of your payment is on his way to you now."
"Oh yes," Karsen heard a short, bark-like laugh over the phone. "I'd take Jack Bauer's pain over a million dollars any day."
Karsen could sense that the man was becoming pacified now, and it would be a good time to get off the phone with him. "Anyway I still have things to do, so you should let me get back to it."
"Of course," the man agreed.
"Don't call me again unless it's an emergency," Karsen pressed. "The last thing either of us needs is a stronger link between you and me."
They both hung up without pleasantries.
"What the hell did this Bauer guy do to him that messed him up so bad?" Karsen muttered to himself.
The familiar intercom noise distracted Adrian from his work. When he looked at his phone, he saw that it was coming from channel nine, which meant it had to be the agents he had sent to check up on Jack.
"CTU, Rouse," he answered.
"This is Agent Wright," said the man on the other end. "Agent Martin and I are at LAPD. There are fifteen dead bodies over here. Four of them are cops and three look like some of the hostiles. We've taken the ID's of the cops."
"Is there a Sergeant Jarrett among them? He was heading up the Burbank mission with Agent Bauer," Adrian asked.
"Yeah, he was found dead in one of the cells," Agent Wright answered.
"What about Agent Bauer?" Adrian asked.
"I don't see him, but knowing Jack, if he was here I'm sure he was the one who killed the hostiles."
"Well he hasn't been in contact, which means if he was there when it happened and he survived, he must have been taken captive."
"There's one more thing, maybe unrelated," Agent Wright told him. "We found some broken glass outside the station, looked like it was from a taillight. I don't know if that's relevant or not."
"Okay, thanks," Adrian said, and he disconnected the call. Not wanting to tell him over the intercom, Adrian ran up to Jennings's office.
"What is it?" Jennings asked, concerned, when he burst through the door without knocking.
"PD's been hit," Adrian said quickly. "The officer Jack was with in Burbank was one of the dead, and there's no sign of Jack anywhere."
"My god," Jennings said.
"The agent said that they found taillight glass at the site," Adrian told him.
Jennings thought for a second and nodded. He pressed his intercom button.
"O'Brian," said a tense voice.
"Chloe, I need you to log on to the traffic cams," Jennings said to her.
"I'm busy, can't someone else do it?" Chloe asked.
"Chloe, when I tell you to do something I don't expect you to talk back to me," Jennings said sternly. "Now I need you to find a vehicle travelling away from LAPD in any direction that has a taillight out."
"Okay, but for the record, I was in the middle of something else," Chloe said.
"Well whatever it is, this is more important. We have an agent's life in danger, so do it now!" he raised his voice at her.
There was a brief silence over the line, and Jennings heard Chloe end the call without saying anything else.
Adrian and Jennings traded a look between them. "That girl is really weird," Adrian commented.
Palmer walked back down the corridor towards the Oval Office. Wayne was waiting by the door.
"Well, what did the doctor say?" he asked Palmer.
His brother brushed past him without looking him in the eye. "I have a country to run, Wayne," he said.
Wayne sighed. "I'm sorry, David," he muttered under his breath, and walked away from the President's office.
The car started to slow down. Jack tried to look at where they were, but he had been restrained. He managed to lift his head enough to see that they were in an industrial area. They came to a stop and the men got out of the front. They opened up the back door and roughly dragged Jack out. He tried to struggle against them but couldn't as they took him into a large factory.
As they went up countless flights of stairs, Jack tried to see out of the windows to get any clue as to where they were. But everything looked the same as any other industrial landscape in the Los Angeles area.
Once they reached one of the top floors, they took Jack into a small room. It was very poorly lit, with only one small lamp by one wall, which apart from a desk and a chair in the middle was the only furniture.
There was a man standing in the room, in front of the lamp so his face was hidden in shadow.
"Leave us," he croaked to the other two, and they promptly walked out of the room. "Well, well, Jack Bauer at my mercy," he said with satisfaction when they were alone.
"Who are you?" Jack asked. The man abruptly grabbed the lamp and held it under his face, so his features were grotesquely exaggerated by the light.
"Seth?" Jack said in disbelief.
The ragged man smiled. "Glad you remembered me, old friend."
8:00pm