Day 6 Episode 3

The following takes place from 9:00 AM to 10:00 AM.

Jack positioned himself flat against the wall and reached for the door knob into the building.

"Jack stop!" Jack heard Audrey's urgent voice in his ear bud and froze, "Jack, I've repositioned the satellite and I can see more men waiting immediately inside and surrounding that door!"

"Can you see any alternate entrance that is unguarded?" Jack asked.

"Let me look," Audrey alternately repositioned the satellite and zoomed in on entrances, "No, Jack they're all heavily guarded. You're walking into a trap." Jack frowned upon hearing this and headed back to his car so he would not be seen while he made a plan.

"Jack?" Audrey asked hesitantly, "I'm sorry, but I think that you should come back and take Curtis and assemble a team and a plan."

"But—"

"I know you want to get to Chloe," Audrey began as Jack interrupted, "I want to rescue her as much as you do, but you know you won't be of any use to her captured or killed." There was silence on Jack's end of the line. Jack never liked having to back away or retreat from a hostage situation, even if just until a better plan could be formed. And he thought of Chloe and the last time she had been in the field. Plainly put, she did better in front of a computer than she did in front of a gun.

"OK," he finally relented, "I'm coming back. Brief Curtis."

Commercial Break

"How old are you?" Chloe asked Hans. She wasn't sure if he would answer, but she had a plan forming the back of her mind. If she could get Hans and his laptop to help her, they could warn Jack and stop whatever the terrorists were planning. To her, Hans didn't seem like a hardened terrorist, and she wondered how he became involved with the other men.

"I'm 17." It took Hans a long time to answer, as if he was deciding what the right response was, or whether to answer at all. Chloe choked. She'd never imagined that he was that young.

"How did you get involved with this…this…group?" Chloe asked gently. She was almost scared to hear the answer. She hadn't wanted to call them terrorists, because, in her experience, most terrorists did not think they were terrorists, but patriots.

Hans narrowed his dark blue eyes. He seemed to be deciding whether or not he should trust her. Finally he must have decided to trust her because he started to talk.

"My father worked with these men. He would come home late at night, or sometimes not at all. I don't know if my mother knew what he did for a living, but he made money, and that was all that was important. One day he came home past midnight and woke me up." Hans said, staring at his hands which had clenched into fists, "He was bleeding from what looked like a gunshot wound. I had always wondered what he did, but I had never dared to ask. That night was the first time I learned anything about what he did. He took me out into the darkened yard, and we sat under a tall tree. He told me that he was going to die," Han stopped when Chloe gasped, but she motioned for him to continue, "Yeah, just like that: 'Hans, son, I'm going to die.' Anyway, he gave me a briefcase and a phone number and he said I should call it and the owner of the cell phone would know what to do. So I brought him back inside, and he died, and we told the neighbors and my younger siblings that he had been sick. I think my mother knew how he had really died though."

"What was in the briefcase?" Chloe asked. It was rare that she said so many words without a hint of sarcasm, but she really was interested in what she was hearing.

"The suitcase?" Hans asked, "Well I didn't open it at first, or call that number, because I didn't want any part in my father's business. I'd gone to school, learned English pretty well, and planned on moving to America. I didn't want any part in my father's work, which I thought was something like a German mafia."

"What changed your mind? I mean, you're obviously well educated because your English is good, so you could have pursued another line of work, but you're here now holding me hostage, so obviously something happened." Chloe said.

"My mother got sick." Hans said simply, "The doctors in my small village had no idea what it was. Although we have free healthcare in Germany, she was put on the bottom of a very long waiting list. I knew she would die before she reached the top. I decided to make some money so I could afford to bring her to America or pay for her to see a private doctor. I needed to make some money quick, so, I called the number and, well, you can probably figure out the rest. As for the briefcase, it held my father's guns."

"Gosh," Chloe said, "you must feel terrible because you didn't want to be here to begin with because you thought you were a better man than that, but then your mother got sick and now you're killing thousands of innocent people and Jack Bauer to save her."

"Yes," Hans said directly, which surprised her, because people generally just cringed or yelled at her whenever she was bluntly honest, "but I had no other option." He continued.

"I have another option." Chloe offered.

Commercial Break

"So if we send some men in that door as decoys, hopefully we can pull some of the men off this door and you and I as well as the rest of our team can overpower them and get inside." Curtis pointed to the map while he talked, and then looked into Jack's face.

"All right, and if the decoys don't work, we're going in anyway. Understood? And no one, under any circumstance is to hit Chloe. The hostage is our first priority here, ok?" Jack barked.

"Jack, calm down. We all value Chloe as much as you do. No of us are going to harm Chloe or put her in harms way." Curtis turned to the assembled team after talking to Jack. "Is everyone clear on the plan? All right, let's move out. All teams await instructions from Bauer."

"Jack?" Audrey had been listening to Curtis brief Jack and his team, and she ran up to Jack as he was about to leave. "Be careful, Jack. I still think you're walking into a trap."

"I'll be fine." He calmly assured her as he slipped his canvas messenger bag over his head.

Commercial Break

"…so when Jack Bauer comes, he'll get both of us out, and the government can pay for flying your mother into one of the best hospitals in the nation, because you helped CTU." Chloe finished outlining her plan.

"But if Schmidt finds out, he'll tell the boss and they'll kill me. Then, I'll never be able to help my mother." Hans expressed his concern.

Chloe frowned. She hated when people thought she was stupid. "I'm really good with computers," she modestly assured Hans, "believe me, I'm better than all the techies here put together, if you let me do my thing, there's no way anyone will ever find out. Until Jack Bauer comes, that is. Believe me, they won't know what hit them."

Hans VonKreis looked at her for a long time, then he looked at the wall, then back at her. Several minutes later he had decided.

"I don't know why I trust you, but I do." Chloe was surprised at his statement. Hardly anyone trusted her immediately. Except Jack, and eventually Audrey, which was why Chloe was so loyal to them.

"So you'll do it?" Chloe had a hard time keeping a smile off her face as she reached for his laptop. The instant the computer was in her hands she was back in control.

"Keep a look out." She ordered Hans. "The instant you see anyone coming, turn your back to them and grab the laptop. But make it look like you're hitting me or something."

"I would never hit you." Hans said, sounding shocked.

"I know!" Chloe hissed impatiently, "but pretend."

Chloe got to work with the laptop. In a matter of minutes she had hacked into the CTU network, using her own passwords of course. There would be no way for someone with out her passwords to hack in, she thought proudly. As she was hacking in, she made mental notes about some of the possible weaknesses in the system she had created. Before long she had forged a connection with Jack's PDA.

CO: jack? it's chloe

JB: chloe? What the hell! Jack thought in astonishment.

JB: how…

CO: i've convinced one of my captors to help me. i'm using his laptop

JB: there are people surrounding all the entrances. can you help me get in?

CO: yes, do you have a schematic of the building or satellite feeds?

JB: both

CO: we'll create a diversion and free up the northwest door.

JB: i'm about two minutes out.

CO: let me get to work.

Chloe handed the computer back to Hans and told him that they needed a diversion to free up the northwest door. Hans thought for a moment.

"Stay here," he commanded, "I'll leave my cell phone on vibrate in your pocket, I'll use my radio to call the cell phone and when I do, call Bauer and tell him it is safe to come in." He handed her his cell phone and loosely re-tied her hands. Chloe nodded and Hans set off.

In a darkened room at the back of the building where Chloe was being held hostage, two men removed their ear buds. The looked at each other and picked up their guns. They had heard enough.

A/N: Just a little note about the Chloe/ Jack transaction from her laptop to his PDA: CO and JB are obviously thier intials. The italicized text is when they're typing to each other.

I really like to hear you're thoughts and comments. HINT, HINT Please, please, please author is down on knees begging please, please, please, review. (Did I mention that I think you should review?) :)