9:00 A.M. – Neither the Palmdale officers of the satellite can find Numair in the area near the prison. Buchanan is frustrated because Numair is a nuclear engineer and can build a bomb.
9:02 A.M. – Milo asks Morris for help on the search, but Morris claims he is doing a task for Chloe. Chloe denies assigning any work to him. Milo tells Morris off and orders him to do what he is told.
9:04 A.M. – Karen lets the President know that a suitcase nuke might potentially kill hundreds of thousands of people. “Get me Jack Bauer,” Wayne intones.
9:05 A.M. – Jack is with Assad and Curtis going over the wreckage at the storage facility. Curtis makes it clear to Assad that he is still the enemy. Wayne calls Jack and asks him to take charge of the search for Fayed. Jack isn’t sure if he is up to the task, but has dutifully accepts the President’s request.
9:06 A.M. – Jack pleads with Curtis to accept Assad as part of the investigation because he is invaluable. Curtis snidely questions what the Chinese did to Jack that would affect his judgment. Assad interrupts with news that a PDA was found in the blast site. It says that the “visitor” arrived last week. Assad says that this is a code for a nuclear weapon. He thinks Numair must be the key to making the device operational.
9:08 A.M. – Jack warns Curtis that nothing is more important than finding Fayed and Numair. Yet just in case, Jack calls Chloe to secretly run a cross check on any relationship between Curtis and Assad.
9:09 A.M. – Numair arrives at Fayed’s safe house and he examines the nuclear device. It still requires Ahmed’s component to reprogram the trigger.
9:10 A.M. – Ahmed orders Ray to deliver the component to Fayed, but Ray refuses. Ray threatens to destroy the component unless he knows his family is safe. Ahmed will only release one of them, and he lets Jillian go. Ahmed instructs Jillian to drive away and call her husband on the payphone to prove she is safe. He warns her that he will shoot Scott if she calls the police.
9:11 A.M. – Jillian calls Ray from the road, and both aren’t sure whether Ahmed will kill Scott regardless of their actions. Ray doesn’t want to risk it. He phones Ahmed from the payphone and receives an address to deliver the package to Fayed.
9:13 A.M. – Despite her husband’s wishes, Jillian calls 911.
9:19 A.M. – Chloe tries to break up an argument between Milo and Morris by laying the cards on the table. She dated Milo a few times, but it didn’t work out so she got back together with Morris. She orders the two of them to get over it. Both men are a bit embarrassed and return to work.
9:21 A.M. – Buchanan puts through Jillian’s call to Jack. She explains that Ahmed is holding her son captive so that her husband will deliver a package to someone named Fayed. Jack heads to Jillian’s house. Curtis is reluctant to have Assad accompany them on a tactical mission, but he follows Jack’s command.
9:22 A.M. – The President meets with an ambassador from a Middle East country. While the ambassador is not one hundred percent sure, he has reason to believe that Assad wants to negotiate towards peace. This corroborates Jack’s claim. Karen wants to lock down cooperation with Assad. Lennox is hesitant to form such a partnership with a known terrorist.
9:24 A.M. – Wayne calls Jack and tells him he wants to make a formal arrangement with Assad. Wayne speaks to Assad and offers him full protection and a pardon for past crimes in return for his help finding Fayed and a commitment to furthering peace. Assad asks for the pledge in writing. Jack tells the President that he is glad he did not have to make that decision himself.
9:25 A.M. – Lennox intercepts a call from Sandra and refuses to disturb the President. She is angry that Walid is still being held in prison. Sandra threatens to embarrass the Administration in order to protect Walid. She says she will hold Lennox personally responsible if anything happens to him.
9:26 A.M. – Walid is lead into the Anacostia Detention Facility in Washington. Salim, the man who Walid stood up for in the lineup, recognizes him and says, “Before this day is over, they will all pay.” Although he doesn’t understand Arabic, Walid listens intently as Salim speaks to another man.
9:28 A.M. – Ray arrives at Fayed’s safe house with the package. Fayed is not pleased, but intends to keep Ray alive as a bargaining chip in case something goes wrong.
9:31 A.M. – Ray tries to explain that Ahmed will release his son if Fayed gives the OK. Fayed calls Ahmed and chides him for involving an outsider. He orders Ahmed to kill the boy.
9:37 A.M. – Lennox advises the President to keep Assad’s official pardon hidden from the public, and he and Karen are able to work up a statement that is palatable to the press. Lennox confides to Wayne that he is still not comfortable colluding with Assad. “It makes me appreciate your loyalty all the more,” Wayne says.
9:38 A.M. – Jack and his TAC team pull up to the Wallace house and scan the perimeter.
9:39 A.M. – Inside, Scott questions why Ahmed is still holding him captive when his father completed the task. Ahmed is about to kill Scott, who begs for his life.
9:41 A.M. – The TAC team raids the house and Ahmed shoots back. Ahmed is about to fire at Jack when another agent shoots Ahmed. Jack calls for the EMT because he needs Ahmed awake enough to tell him where Ray took the package. Yet Scott remembers the address and tells the agents. Jack quickly calls it in to Buchanan.
9:48 A.M. – With the location of Fayed’s safe house now known, Chloe pulls up satellite images of the area. Buchanan calls the White House with the news that they may have found the suitcase nuke.
9:49 A.M. – Sandra visits Walid at the Anacostia Facility. He tells her that he overheard some of the inmates repeat an Arabic phrase he didn’t understand. He thinks it has connections with the terrorist attacks. Walid must convince Sandra to forget her lawyer tendencies and pass on the phrase to the FBI. They kiss goodbye.
9:50 A.M. – Jack gives Assad the pardon from the President. Assad wishes him luck and shakes his hand.
9:51 A.M. – Curtis is angry that Assad has been given a pardon by the United States government. Jack explains that it is up to neither of them. Curtis seemingly accepts this.
9:52 A.M. – Jillian returns home, and Jack explains that his team will try to save Ray. Chloe tells Jack that she found a connection between Curtis and Assad. After Desert Storm, Assad’s men ambushed Curtis’s squad and beheaded some of his soldiers.
9:53 A.M. – Jack finds Curtis outside with his gun held up to Assad’s forehead. Jack tells him to put down his weapon by order of the President. Curtis refuses. Jack says that he gave Assad his word that he would protect him. As Curtis keeps his gun trained, Jack begs him to stop. “I can’t let this animal live,” Curtis says. Jack shoots Curtis in the neck and the TAC members shuffle Assad to safety.
9:55 A.M. – Jack drops his gun and raises his hands in a gesture not of surrender but of despair at Curtis’s death. Jack walks away in tears. He vomits and falls to the ground.
9:56 A.M. – Buchanan calls Jack after hearing what happened and tries to bolster his spirits. “Tell the President I’m sorry,” Jack says. “I can’t do this anymore.” Buchanan beseeches him to continue with the mission because he is needed. Jack says he is done and hangs up. He continues sobbing.
9:57 A.M. – Buchanan remains pensive and a bit shaken by his conversation with Jack. He gets word that Ahmed died of his wounds. CTU and the White House teams watch on monitors as the TAC teams get into position at Fayed’s safe house.
9:58 A.M. – Numair completes work on the suitcase nuke. One of the guards sees the TAC teams and gunfire erupts. Ray ducks to the ground. Amid the shooting, Numair detonates the nuclear device.
From where he is, Jack can see the mushroom cloud in the sky.
The White House team is in shock. Wayne orders Karen to put the entire military at the disposal of the Los Angeles response teams.
9:59 A.M. – As CTU watches the video in horror, Milo alerts them to a warning from the FBI. An Arabic phrase was overheard at one of the detention centers. Nadia translates it: “five visitors.” There are four more nuclear weapons out there.