Chapter 3

The Following takes place between 10:00 A.M. and 11:00 A.M.

There were a lot of ironies about this day that George Mason would never learn about. However, the ones he did learn were grim enough. The first was that he would never follow up on the lead that he had claimed to go out for. He was still a good twenty minutes from Bakersfield when his phone rang.

"George, this is Tony. How far out of the city are you?"

"Why?"

"I just got off the line with Steve Lauler from District."

"About what?"

Tony wasn't thrilled about this either. "LAPD made a possible match with a vehicle on our watch list. He needs somebody to check it out.

"LAPD made a match? Come on.'

"Well, Lauler doesn't trust their judgment either. That's why he wants you there." George was sure Tony deliberately paused before continuing. "Besides, he knows it's on your way to Bakersfield. I know you're going there to follow up on a lead, but Lauler wants this checked out."

George disliked Lauler immensely but also knew better than to mess with a superior's request. And if he did survive the day—nuclear blast or not— he'd still like his job. And if the bomb did go off, he wanted every last report about him to be positive. "What's the address?" he said resignedly.

Sydney knew that tracking Wald's crew was going to be difficult. They were already on high alert for whatever job they were doing, and if she tried to track them by visual surveillance, they would probably kill Bauer. So she'd have to use some of her magic, which meant----

"CTU, Marshall."

"Marshall, it's Sydney."

"Syd, hey, I guess this means that you and Bauer passed your audition with Wald's crew!"

"Yes and no. They bought Bauer; me they're not so crazy about. He and I got separated, and right now he and Wald's crew are off to do some dirty work."

"Um--- does that mean you've found the--- the nuke?"

"Not even close, Marshall. They're up to something hinky. I just don't know what, and unless I can find Bauer, we have no idea what our next move is. That's why I called."

"What do you need?" Marshall's voice had become business-like.

"I don't suppose that you were able to place any kind of tracking device on Bauer?" Sydney asked.

"No. Guy was really touchy. After he got suited up, he insisted on no wires or electronics. I got to tell you, Syd, on a more, um, personal note, Jack Bauer kind of creeps me out a little."

For Marshall to admit something like this was big. Though he had often acted nervous around Sloane and Sydney's father, he managed to usually cover it with his nervous wit. To openly admit his concerns meant he was fundamentally unsettled…She pondered it for a split second. Marshall knew Arvin Sloane, knew his resume as intimately as she did, and knew precisely how evil he was. With Bauer, Marshall knew nothing, and still Jack scared him—so, either Marshall was just better with the devil he knew, or he may have had a better sense of who was the more dangerous.

"We'll worry about that later." Sydney reassured her friend. "Right now, I need to use the satellite system and communications webs to track a vehicle. Gray Ford van, three doors, California plates, license number TZM-64J9. Last seen leaving Atlas's Auto Repair headed west, approximately----" Syd checked her watch "---five minutes ago."

"Got it." Sydney had never been more grateful for Marshall's photographic memory. "How are you going to be tracking Bauer?"

"I'll be using the Ford Escalade we left at the just outside of the garage. Obviously, I can't track Bauer that closely, so I'm going to need the best alternate route available."

"Copy that."

"I don't care what spy cameras you have to look through or traffic laws you have to break, Marshall" Sydney said earnestly "just keep an eye on Bauer. And make sure Mason gets all this."

"Actually, Director Mason's out of the office now. But I'll update Mr. Almeida and Mr.---"

Marshall's voice was suddenly cut-off by a buzz of static. "Marshall, did you get that?" Sydney could hear someone talking but it was barely audible.

Back at CTU, the place was in chaos. "Something's wrong with my phone." Marshall said

"Mine too." said Tony Almeida, hanging up.

"I know." said Paula. "I tried a filter and I can't get rid of it. It may not be our systems.

Tony looked at her. "If the city of Los Angeles is going to be nuked all because of the phone company, I want a nasty letter drafted to AT&T before we go." Almeida sighed "Today of all days…All right. Call the phone company and switch all protocol calls to wireless."

10:07:15/10:07:16/10:07:17

Jack Bauer could have told the people at CTU what had happened to their phone. Scotty, who seemed to be the technical guy, was screwing around with one of the power settings a few miles away from the unit.

"Trying to shut off their phone lines?" Jack asked casually.

Scotty, who clearly distrusted him, didn't answer. Eddie did. "Just enough to make them call the phone company. Have them send out a crew." He looked at Jack for a moment. "Why don't you head up the road? Keep an eye out for anybody?"

Jack knew he was on thin ice with these people but he didn't care about this right now, so he said 'No problem" and starting slowly walking back towards the van.

The second he was out of Eddie's line of sight, he pulled out his cell phone and dialed CTU. Unfortunately, it seemed that whatever Sam was doing to the phones was already working; all that he could get when they picked up was a blast of static. "Hello? Is this CTU?" After several seconds of static, he gave up. "Damn it!" he said.

Now he regretted not having gotten Bristow's cell number. It was a rookie mistake, but the truth was he had all but ignored Bristow at the garage. He had resented being put in such a situation, and he had let his resentment get the better of him. But he had no time for recriminations. Knowing every second counted, he dialed the other number that he had been given.

"Northwest Regional." said a female voice.

"I need to speak with the President."

"Who is this?"

"My name is Jack Bauer. Clearance number is 8119A. I need to speak with the President now."

"Please hold."

"Don't put---" The link clicked. Precious seconds went by before another voice answered the phone.

"This is Lynn Kresge."

"I need to speak with the President." Jack said urgently.

"The President's with the press corps right now."

Jack would have argued this more but he saw Eddie was starting to move. He moved to the side of the car and talked faster. "Listen carefully. CTU phone lines are down. I need you to get them an urgent message. CTU Los Angeles is going to be blown up within the hour. Wald's group is doing it. It is not the nuke. But you need to evacuate CTU and to alert a bomb squad. There are at least three---"

"Jack----"

Suddenly Jack saw Eddie walking around the van. He pulled his phone from his ear, hung up and put it in his jacket mere seconds before he saw him.

"We're done." Eddie said simply, and pulled the doors open.

Jack hoped like hell Kresge had gotten enough of the message. He had no idea what struggles were going on at the seat of power.

He had no way of knowing that Eric Raeburn, the head of NSA would intercept Kresge before she could inform the President. No way of knowing that Raeburn would decide that because of his concern that Bauer would be exposed to Wald's crew, thus stopping him from getting to the nuke, that Raeburn would unilaterally decide not to inform President David Palmer.

He had no idea that the lives of everyone at CTU had suddenly been classified by the NSA as acceptable collateral damage.

10:13:48/10:13:49/10:13:50/10:13:51

Nadia hadn't been in the women's room that long before she heard the door open. She didn't look up from the sink. "Have they got the phones working yet?" she asked.

"Not for lack of trying." said Michelle. She walked over to the sink "Your tech guy, Marshall? He'sbusy trying to redirect the communications from the FBI server." She smiled. "The second Paula heard that she told Marshall that she might be able to use two of the nearby satellites to get us back the full speed. I only understand every third word they're saying, but they can probably get our phones working soon enough if we gave them enough time and memory." She splashed some water on her face

This did make Nadia smile. "I'm not surprised. Marshall's one of the best techs I've met." she said. "Give him the right material, he could probably figure out that whole cold fusion thing." The smile faded. "Everyone at APO is good at their jobs."

"Look, I realize we haven't exactly welcomed you with open arms--" Michelle began

"It's more than that. At least for me." Nadia paused, and then seemed to ask a random question. "Do you love your parents?"

Michelle blinked. "I'm not sure I follow you."

"I grew up as a ward of the state." Nadia said. "I didn't have the best childhood, I went through a lot of foster care and juvenile homes, and I didn't have a clue as to who my parents were. I thought that they must love me, and that there had to be some reason that they left me behind. When I started working for intelligence out of Buenos Aires, part of me kept hoping against hope that I'd be able to find them and learn why." She swallowed. "You imagine my shock when I find the sister I never I knew I had and I learn that both my mother and my father are both terrorists."

Michelle knew who Sydney Bristow's mother was. She had also overheard Tony's talk with Nadia "Your mother is--"

A bitter smile crossed Nadia's face. "If there's something to heredity, I am really screwed. " Nadia turned to Michelle. "Miss Dessler, I'm not blind." she said. "My father has done some unforgivable things. To this country, to the people in this unit--- to me. But I believe--- I have to believe--- that he has reformed, that he is a changed man. Not only to work with him, but because I need to love my father. I know how maudlin that must sound, and how potentially dangerous, but still---"

"I understand." Michelle walked over and put her hand on her shoulder. "And it's Michelle."

Nadia looked up. "My father is not a nice man, Michelle, but he doesn't want this weapon to be detonated any more than you do. I believe he can help us."

As much as Michelle felt for Nadia's situation, it would take a lot more than a daughter's love to convince herthat Sloane was playing on the level. She did, however, think his daughter could be trusted--, untilthere was evidence to the contrary. In this case, that last thought wasn't personal, just a matter of experience (she had read the file on Nina Meyers). "Well, let's go back to work; see if any of those leads have panned out into anything yet."

As Nadia and Michelle left the woman's room, they came out to find that something was going down. Paula had left her station and was walking towards Marshall's desk. Tony was walking around looking steamed.

"What's going on? We find anything?" Michelle asked.

Tony shook his head. "That asshole Raeburn called and said he wants us to copy all our data on the nuclear threat to the NSA server."

Vaughn, from a nearby station, looked up. "They give a reason?"

"They say that it's just precautionary, but they want it done now."

"When is now?" asked Nadia.

"By 11."

"11?" Michelle frowned. "That's a three hour job."

"I know. I told him that." Tony was scowling now. "He told me that I'd better get started."

Marshall came running over to him. "Um, Mr. Almeida, I think that Paula and I can get the phones working if you just let us run the satellites----"

"Marshall, I'm going to need you to drop this for now. I need you and Paula to sort and send data to the NSA server. Everything we have related to the nuke."

Marshall seemed a little put off by this. "Okay, but you do know we'll have to work up a whole new encryption code, and you know that kind of thing could take a couple of hours--"

"Marshall, you have forty minutes." Tony said flatly.

This only slowed Marshall for a couple of seconds. "Okay, it's not like I don't like a challenge, but really that kind of is pressing it a bit. I mean, I can probably do it, but----"

"Marshall, maybe you better get going." Vaughn said gently.

"Okay, um, sure. Thank you." Marshall scurried off.

Tony watched him move away, then glanced to Vaughn. "Doesn't he have a 'slow' setting?"

"By the time this day is over, you'll be glad he doesn't." Vaughn said with a smile. "What the hell is going on here? First, the phones, now NSA wants all the data on the bomb."

"They said it was precautionary." Tony said.

"Then wouldn't they do it for every agency?" Michelle asked.

Tony thought this over. "Call Dixon up at Division. See if something hinky is going on."

When Mason found the address, there was an LAPD cruiser and four men in uniform waiting for him. He got out of his sedan and introduced himself as CTU to the cops.

"Sergeant Ryan, LAPD." The sergeant gestured to a younger officer. "Barber here made a vehicle match from the alert you put out this morning."

George looked at the building. Aside from the fact that it was some kind of storage unit, there wasn't anything remarkable about the place. "Have you checked inside yet?"

"We were about to, but our captain made us stand down until you got here." Mason could sense the resentment in Ryan's voice.

"Relax sergeant. I want to be here even less then you want me to be here." He looked at one of the officer, holding a saw.

Seeing his approval, the officer used his saw to cut through the lock holding the roll-down door closed. It took less than thirty seconds--- apparently whoever was here didn't seem to care much for security.

George took out his gun, nodded and the two officers rolled the door up. A few seconds later, he and Sergeant Ryan ducked under the door.

All that was immediately visible inside the shed were boxes and containers. The place seemed deserted but Mason wasn't convinced it was. He was therefore pissed when one of the younger officers shouted: "Hello?" Mason rolled his eyes as the sergeant gestured that quiet might be desired for this kind of work.

They walked further into the unit, flashlights on because there didn't seem to be any power in this structure. Eventually, they reached something that wasn't boxes stacked on top of each other. "What the hell?" George muttered.

There was some kind of line of doors about twenty feet ahead of them. It looked benign, but there was some kind of greenish glow emanating from it----- never a good sign. He and the officers cautiously approached the doors.

One of the officers gently pulled back on one of them. They approached a glass structure where the glow was coming from. Mason was the first man there, and was therefore the first to see the dead man lying a few feet from the structure. He also saw the sign on the structure--- with a radiation symbol on it.

Suddenly, a man appeared and he was firing an automatic weapon. The officer next to Mason was hit and George hit the ground. The stream of bullets also hit the glass and it shattered, dust streaming out of it. The man came a few more feet before one of the other cops took him out.

"You okay?' Ryan yelled out.

"There's a man down in here." Mason said, starting to get to his feet. Then he saw the sign that said 'DANGER--- RADIOACTIVE MATERIAL.'

And he saw the dust that was not dust blowing around him.

"Get out of the building." When he saw Ryan hesitate, he yelled: "Get out of the building. Call Hazmat. Get them to set up quarantine. I think we've got a hot zone here!"

He got to feet, and then saw what might have been a container of radioactive residue a few feet away. He pulled out a handkerchief, praying desperately that he hadn't inhaled too much of it.

10:26:44/10:26:45/10:26:46

Dixon's hope that things would be easier when he got to Division had dried up when he learned that he was going to be working with Ryan Chapelle. He had worked with the man a couple of times before and found him to be one of the most annoying pricks he had the displeasure of knowing. It wasn't that Chapelle was a bad man; it was that he was the quintessential bureaucrat, more concerned with procedure being followed than positive results.

This had become clear when Chapelle had told Dixon that he was going to be working on evacuation protocols and target readiness. Doing this when they had no idea where the bomb was putting the cart rather substantially before the horse, but when Dixon had pointed this out to Chapelle, he had fixed with an intractable glance and told him to follow protocol or he'd send him home.

As it was, he had no time to follow these particular protocols before receiving a series of calls. The first was from Sydney, who was contacting Dixon because she couldn't raise anyone at CTU. While admitting this was a concern, it wasn't her main problem.

Bauer had infiltrated Wald's crew. Unfortunately, in order to do so Syd had to get out of the picture. She had been attempting to track Bauer by using satellite imagery when she had been cut off. She had Dixon to call someone at LAPD and get access to their traffic cameras. This kind of thing wasn't Division protocol, but Dixon hadn't hesitated to do it.

The second call was from Vaughn, basically telling him the same thing Sydney had five minutes earlier. This had raised a very important question.

"What the hell are you using to contact me?" Dixon asked.

"Sloane's phone." Vaughn said. "And don't think that hasn't knocked the comfort level down a notch. Tony's holding it like it was a small bomb."

"Well, Marshall did design it." Dixon said facetiously. "That might have been an extra setting."

"Good point." Vaughn said. "In any case, we've hit another snag. Raeburn from NSA called and demanded we upload all the data on the bomb onto their server in thirty minutes."

"They give any reason why they want it done that fast?"

"They say it was just to consolidate information, but I've got a feeling they're not telling us something. Can you check with Chapelle and see if we're just being paranoid?" Vaughn asked

"I'll look into it right away. By the way, you've got to reestablish contact with Sydney; she's trying to keep tabs on Bauer."

"I'll handle it."

Unfortunately, Dixon then turned around to see Chapelle walking up to him looking pissed--- an expression that Dixon was pretty sure was one of only three that the Division head had.

"What the hell are you doing wasting Division resources on looking through the LAPD traffic camera?" Chapelle demanded.

Dixon had Arvin Sloane for a boss--- this kind of bluster barely upset him. "I'm using their camera to try and track down where Joseph Wald's crew is heading "he said angrily. "And the only reason I'm wasting our resources is because right now Sydney Bristow can't keep in touch with CTU because their landlines are scrambled. "

"That's their problem." Chapelle snapped.

"If it keeps us from finding the nuke, it's our problem." Dixon countered. "You want to piss and moan over this or do want us to get the job done?"

Chapelle was the type who was never wrong, even when he was. His reaction was to change the subject. "Right now, we have a more pressing concern." he told Dixon. "I just got a call from George Mason. That lead we found in Panorama City turned out to have legsand so far it just kicked the ass of the LAPD."

As it turned out, at that very moment George Mason was in the hot zone, simultaneously disrobing and debriefing.

"Looks like the lead in the city turned out to be the real thing." he said to Tony as he took off his tie. "Some kind of lab where they may have assembled the nuke."

"Based on what?" asked Tony.

"They found radioactive material." Mason took off his jacket.

"What kind of radioactive material?"

Mason removed his shoes. "They're still doing field analysis."

"Was anyone exposed?"

At that moment one of the Hazmat men pointed to his watch. Sighing, he took it off before he spoke again. "They're putting us through Decon now. Purely precautionary."

Attaboy George. Sound like you're not scared shitless. He ignored the internal voice and went on. "Look, we got three dead bodies. I'm gonna send you photos and fingerprints on them. See if they show up on our watch list."

He began to take off his pants. One of the Hazmat people told him he'd have to dump his phone. "Look Tony I'm gonna have to get back to you."

"George, we got a call from NSA. They told us to send them all of our case analysis. Now I've got Paula on it now, but I've got a feeling they're keeping us out of the loop on something."

"It's standard procedure for all agencies to consolidate information." George said as he unbuttoned his shirt.

"That's just it. We're the only agency they've asked."

"Sir, the phone." said the man in the radiation suit. George grimaced at this double irritation.

"Look, call Chapelle at Division and see if he can find anything. I gotta go." he said as he threw his shirt in the bag.

"George, are you sure you're okay?" Some concern finally seeped into Tony's voice.

"Yeah, I'm fine." George hung up before Tony could press anymore. He threw his phone in the bag.

"I need all your clothes, sir." said the Hazmat man.

"You're not even gonna buy me dinner?" George managed to joke as he threw his shorts in the bag.

Then he stepped up to get hosed down, hoping that this wouldn't be the equivalent of bandaging a bullet wound.

10:37:38/10:37:39/10:37:40/10:37:41

For the purpose of Wald's crew, everything was moving very efficiently. After the phone company had arrived, it had been simple to kill one worker, take the survivor hostage, and use him and his van to infiltrate the CTU parking garage in less than twenty minutes. Five minutes earlier they had left him alone with their hostage, and headed for the CTU elevator. Given what he had seen on the drive over, it would take them fifteen minutes to plant the explosives. That gave him less than ten minutes to go through the map they had left behind, figure out where they would plant the bomb and get word to Mason. (Because Scotty had kept his eyes on Jack since they got in the van, he hadn't even been able to send a text message to CTU. Now, even if the phones worked the signal would never penetrate the concretethe garage.)

As he looked through the map he realized something that, in its own way, could be just as a big a problem. This wasn't a roughly drawn map; it was a professional level blueprint. Only someone in the Agency could have gotten access to it.

Jack wasn't sure if things could get much worse.

After a protracted delay, Sydney was now on the move again. Dixon had come through for her on satellites and she had been able to track Grant's van further west. At least, she had been until she found the vehicle sitting empty at one of the city's minor communications grid. Clearly they had switched automobiles at least half an hour ago.

Sydney knew that they were planning to bomb somewhere, but Grant and his crew wouldn't have gone to all this trouble just to knock the phone lines out. But the communication grid was a good three minutes away from any major traffic light, and with no idea what kind of car they had switched to or what direction they were headed in, she had no idea where to look. So where exactly did that leave her? More importantly, where did that leave Bauer?

She decided right now, her best option was to report in to Mason or Sloane, depending on who was back in the office.

She took out her cell and began to dial. Three digits in, it hit her. CTU was less than five minutes from here, and half an hour she hadn't been able to get through to them because their communications had been down. CTU was the target! The bomb could go off at any moment!

Without thinking, Sydney hit an autodial on her phone that would connect her with Arvin Sloane's cell. He had a special phone that had he was equipped with a shifting-algorithm descrambler that Marshall had designed. It would work even if every other phone was out of operation.

Unfortunately, she only got his voicemail. "Shit!" Sydney swore. Of course the line was busy. If the communications grid had been tampered with, Sloane now had the only working phone. Everybody and his uncle were going to be using it.

No time to worry about it. "This is Sydney. Eddie Grant and his crew havebeen tampering with the communications grid. They are going to detonate a high-level non-nuclear bomb of CTU. Tell Mason to lockdown the unit now! This may be our only shot at stopping them."

Once Sydney had hung up, she realized that Wald's crew could be coming back here any minute, and she had to make sure Bauer maintained his cover.

She all but leaped back into her car. The second she got out of the sight of the automobile she was going to speed-dial Marshall. Bauer's cover had to be maintained but not at that cost of the lives of everybody in that building. There had to be a way to do it, and Marshall might be their only hope.

10:44:30/10:44:31/10:44:32

"Mr. Almeida." Sloane had recovered enough from his dressing-down to do his job, but he seemed to have realized the thinness of the ice he was on.

"What is it, Sloane?"

The man ignored the hostility in Tony's voice. "I believe we may have a lead."

"What's your intel?" he asked briskly.

"While going over the background of the regional cells, we found some billing records that seem to run back to a company called Warner Enterprises. They're an industrial firm centered in LA that has several major weapons contractors as its clientele. Several of the companies do business with three nations that support Second Wave. And there are records of transactions between them and a known hostile named Syed Ali."

"Ali's been on our watch-list for some time," Tony admitted. "You think he's connected to this?"

"I'm not sure, Mr. Almeida. I'd like to send a couple of agents into the field, and it's been made clear to me that I'm just a figurehead, I think you had better give the go-ahead."

"I don't make policy, Sloane. "

"No, of course not, you just carry it out. That's a very nice defense. I'm sure many of my people would use the same excuse."

Tony's mind virtually jammed with the amount of replies to that snide comment. Before he could answer, Sloane said, "I'll send out my people," anf left.

Vaughn heard this last exchange. "He has a way of making you seem wrong, even when you're right." he said.

"Well, you would know." Tony was going to leave on that line.

"Damn it, Tony, you don't have to be like this!" Vaughn said. "The government pays my salary the same as you. We don't want this fucking nuke to go off either!"

"I know that" Tony admitted.

"Then what's with the goddamned chip on your shoulder?"

"You know what the problem is. Four years ago I helped bust the door in on the Alliance! You give the briefing that Sloane is an enemy of this government. Now I can theoretically get my head around the government giving Sloane a pass, Christ knows we do it more often than we should. But you---" Tony shook his head "---how the hell can you work so hard to break a man, and then go into the same office and take orders from him? Explain that!!"

"It's complicated. " Vaughn started.

"Not really." Tony countered. "I know that things are gray a lot of the time on this job, but Sloane--- Sloane is as black and white as it gets."

Tony had no idea how Vaughn would have responded to that, and he never got one because Marshall chose just that moment to run up to them.

"Mr. Sl--- Mr. Alme--- Mr. Sloa----"The poor tech clearly was torn between his old loyalties and the reality of his assignment.

Sloane, of all people, decided to take Marshall off the hook. "What is it, Marshall?" he asked.

"I was going over to Mason's office to help Paula with the new encryption code, um, by the way, is there anyway that NSA could maybe give us another thirty minutes, cause then it will be up, and those people'll off our---"

"Marshall." Sloane said, almost gently.

Instantly Marshall sobered up. "Syd called. She knows where Wald's crew was going." he said.

"Where?" Tony demanded.

"Here" Marshall said. "She thinks that Wald's people screwed around with the phones so that they could access CTU."

Michelle heard this. "The workers from the phone company." She said.

"Are they still in the building?" Vaughn said.

"We have to lock the place down."

The agents got into lockdown positions. Unfortunately for everybody concerned, Eddie Grant and his people had walked out of building a full ninety seconds ago--- just long enough for them to get out the door.

Even more unfortunately, they had done what they had come there to do.

10:51:40/10:51:41/10:51:42/10:51:43

"Is there any sign of them?" Weiss asked Tony.

"No" Tony said resignedly. "And we don't have the time to look for them now. We need to order an evacuation of CTU now."

"Shouldn't we even try to find the bomb?"

"There isn't enough time." Tony was angrier about this then the others. "When this is over, I'm going to have Raeburn's ass for this!" He looked to Michelle. "This is why NSA wanted us to download all our information on the nuke. They knew this was coming." Tony spoke with the anger of someone who has learned something too little and too late. "Order the evacuation, right now."

Michelle hit the alarm and started telling people to get out of the building. At that second, the phone rang. "Almeida." He snapped as he picked it up.

"This is Lynn Kresge, Special Assistant to the President. I have an urgent message for CTU."

Now everybody wants to warn us. Tony thought to himself. Where the fuck was they when we needed them? "Too little, too late, ma'am," he said, his marine training holding him back from unleashing his full vocabulary on her. "We know."

"Everyonequickly move towards the exit. Leave your valuables behind." Michelle Dessler was saying as people began leaving their desks.

Sloane came up to some of the junior agents who hadn't gotten the message. "There's some kind of bomb in the building. Everyone here needs to leave now."

Sloane sounded about as forceful as he ever did. It was enough to get the APO agents up and moving--- except for one.

"Marshall, we need to go." Sloane said to the tech.

"But I haven't finished helping Paula with the encryption key---" he said.

Sloane pushed Marshall to his feet. "We can't worry about that now." He said as he and Weiss began pushing him out.

"B—but, all the data on the nukes on the computer." Marshall continued to protest even as they reached the exit. "If we don't get the data out----"

And then the world exploded.

Dixon stared at the computer screen where information had been coming from CTU not five minutes earlier. A single message was flashing on the screen.

SERVER NOT RESPONDING

"My God." Dixon said. "They hit it. The bastards hit us."

Almost without thinking, he began to put things in the same suitcase he had unpacked less than an hour ago. This did not escape the notice of Chapelle.

"What do you think you're doing?" he said in a voice that was shaken but still indifferent.

"I've got to get back to CTU. They're going to need all hands on deck."

"We've already sent out a rescue team. We've got people from most of the major disaster relief efforts." Chapelle said. "They'll have it covered, Marcus. What can you do that they can't?"

Dixon looked at Chapelle as if he'd grown an extra head. "My friends are all at CTU, Ryan. I want to see if they're still alive!"

"Marcus, with our primary unit hit, we need everybody who's still active working on finding the nuke. We're going to expend all resources trying to get back on track, and right now I need you to coordinate the rescue efforts from here."

Intellectually, Dixon knew this made sense. Emotionally, he was having trouble getting his head around it. "I can do more for CTU from there." he said weakly.

"You're honestly saying you could stay focused if they started pulling your friends corpses out of the rubble?" Chapelle's voice softened a little. "I realize where you're coming from, but I can't lose any more people."

Dixon had forgotten Chapelle could be pretty ruthless himself. Nevertheless, he had a point. So he went back to his station and sat down, feeling like he was trying to stuff his guts back into his chest.

Eddie had gotten the van far enough away from CTU that when the blast came, the explosion was only faintly audible and the tremor mild. Even from a distance, though, you could the smoke spiraling out of the building.

"We did it." Eddie said as he slapped Scotty and the other man on the back. He came over to Jack and punched him in the shoulder.

"Great job, man." Jack managed to sound like he didn't care. Inside, however, he felt as if an explosion had gone off in him.

George Mason didn't know about the blast at CTU. Something as devastating was about to hit him

The Hazmat doctor had finished his examination. "You're clean." he said.

George knew that there was bad news in the tone. "Then why so grim?" he asked.

"The field tests came back. The substance that you inhaled was plutonium. And based on the particle size, the atmosphere dispersion---"

George didn't want to hear it but knew he had to. "Cut to the chase."

"Your radiation level is high." The doctor looked at him. "Definitely lethal."

George managed not to stammer. "How much time do I have?"

"Could be as much as a week." the doctor said. "Or as little as a day."

George managed to remain stoic, even as he realized that he was the first fatality of the nuke.

10:59:57/10:59:58/10:59:59/11:00:00