HOLD YOUR BREATH

I can't take it anymore. After this week's episode and a few more tears shed I realized my heart can't take this show anymore. Between Edgar dying, the President getting assassinated and Michelle getting killed I'm at my braking point. And then this episode! My breathing returned to normal about half an hour later and I reflected on the life of Jack Bauer. It sucks. I mean yeah, he's hot, and talented, and kicks major ass, but he has a lot of heartbreak.

Oh look, Chloe has another emotion besides annoyance

Sealed up in the situation room, Jack, Kim, Audrey, Barry, Chloe, and a few other employees look at the devastation outside the room. High five to all those who work in the bullpen. Bill's up in his office, protected, McGill and a guard are in holding, and thankfully, Tony's in medical, which was luckily sealed off from the attack as well. Bill calls Curtis and tells him their situation. Since Curtis is with the chemical response team, he tells them they'll be there within half an hour. Bill calls down to Jack with the news. Jack wants to know where Henderson is and they pull up his location on the map. He's safely in medical. By safe I mean he's not being attacked by the nerve gas, just Bob the interrogator. They also pull up the building grid and learn the gas masks and atropine are in a secured area. Why Chloe doesn't open that room and everyone make a run for it I don't know. That'd be what I'd do. We'll get to that later though.

Hey, at least he won't have to pine over Chloe anymore

Chloe's in a state of shock, still staring at Edgar's body, but Jack needs her to work. Unlike the normal Chloe, this one's very emotional. Ponyboy decides he can help and with Jack's permission, tries to get her out of the catatonic state. He pulls her away from the window so she stops staring at Edgar's dead body. Let's thank the Lords of Kobol she didn't have to watch him go through what that poor sap in the video Logan watched a few hours ago went through.

"Hi, I'm a moron and this is all my fault"

In the holding cell McGill confesses to the guard that all of this is his fault. He tells the guard that it was his card the terrorist used to get in. The guard then kicks him in the teeth, which makes me feel a whole lot better. He tells the guard he didn't tell anyone because he didn't want people to know he got beat up. Not that they'd be surprised, he's four feet tall. The guard's pissed since he realizes they're all gonna die so McGill didn't feel embarrassed.

Is this the 60s? What's up with the glass IV?

Tony gets out of bed and notices the bodies on the ground. Here's hopin' he doesn't open the door to check out what's going on. Jack calls down to medical and talks to the doctor Tony's with. He wants to know if Henderson got secured and the doctor says he was. Tony's ears perk up when he realizes Henderson's there and he knocks the doctor out and hangs up on Jack. Tony gets to Henderson and takes the interrogator's gun from him. Jack's pulls up the internal feed and sees what's going on with Tony. The tech in the situation room is able to put it on speaker since Chloe's useless in the corner. Jack pleads with Tony not to do it but Tony wants to kill the man responsible for Michelle's death. Jack says that he knows how he feels, he wanted to rip Nina's arms off and beat her with them when she killed Teri. Unfortunately, like Nina before, they need Henderson to find the nerve gas. Jack's able to talk him down and Tony relents, still holding onto the gun. Even though the interrogation continues, and Henderson's inflicted with more pain, he ain't givin' it up.

Just what Logan needs, someone else telling him what to do

Enter a new character, Karen Hayes. She's a top ranking official for Homeland Security and I can already tell she's a bitch, much like McGill before her, Erin Driscoll before him, and Chapelle (RIP) before her. Anyone who's not CTU can suck it because they don't know what they're talking about and don't get how Jack works. Karen's talking to Logan and Vice President Gardner, updating them on CTU's condition. The two of them together are dumb and dumber, asking idiotic questions. I'm not sure how the government works, but when the VP takes over for the President, like Logan did, who becomes VP? I think he happened to be walking by and Logan, in his infinite wisdom, just pointed at him and said, "Him, yeah him. He'll do." Karen says that they should immediately restructure everything to have Homeland Security in charge of finding the nerve gas instead of CTU. Not exactly an appropriate time for a pissing match, lady. Gardner agrees.

Privately, Gardner presses Logan on declaring martial law. Logan's still not convinced this is the best thing. His advisors (Mike) doesn't agree that it's the best thing, since it'll cause more damage then good. Gardner thinks if the terrorists can't run around freely, then it'll flush them out. And guess the hell what? Logan's indecisive. I think if you asked him "cream or sugar" he'd take an hour to decide.

Bierko's fairly happy with how things are working out. He wants to move to the primary target. He also wants all the remaining canisters placed there. Um, a little over kill don't ya think?

Look, it's an 80s movie showdown!

At CTU tensions are high. Jack needs Chloe to help them out but she's still not willing to work. Hello Chloe, you're on the clock here. He tries to press her into helping and Barry interrupts him saying that he doesn't have to push her like that. If he hasn't noticed, it's not like they have time for her to sit on a couch and talk about her "daddy issues". They need her, immediately. Barry makes some sort of comment about Jack not being there for the people he cares about. Uh oh, don't tap on the glass. Jack grabs Barry by the throat and tells him to shut up or he'll make him eat his own testicles. He'd do it to. Kim tells Jack that when she was suicidal, Barry was the only one to get her out of her funk. He gave her a little "therapy" and made it all better. Chloe breaks the tension by announcing that she'll just get back to the computer and work, besides, you can't stare at Edgar too long, you'll get sunspots.

When Chloe gets back to her computer an alarm starts going off. Apparently that wasn't your father's nerve gas. There's some sort of acid laced with the nerve gas and it's corroding the seals to the rooms. (Remember my roommate's comment last episode about putting it into a big hefty bag? Unbeknownst to us at the time, it wouldn't have worked. Would've been really cool if it had though) Chloe estimates it'll be about twenty minutes before they all start dropping like flies.

"Oh dear God, I married a moron"

Meanwhile, Martha overhears Mike and Gardner going at it. Afterwards, she approaches Mike and questions what's going on with Gardner. He admits that Gardner's taking over. Martha's flabborgasted that Logan's letting him write policy. Why the hell not? He let you write it! Martha knows that Gardner just wants Logan to frak up so he has a shot at the Presidency. Something tells me all Gardner has to do is let him finish out the term, he's bound to make more mistakes, hell, it's only been a day and he's made like five. Mike insinuates that in the past Gardner's taken credit for things Logan's done. Like that pie he made for the White House bake off last year. Mike wants Martha to talk to Logan. Didn't she talk to him about this crap last episode? Typical man.

Bill makes an announcement to the remaining CTU employees. Friday is "no tie" day, and oh yeah, the acid is eating away at the seals. Jack talks to Audrey and feels like a tool for insisting Kim stay and it'll be his fault if something happens to her. Um, yeah it will. Just then, Chloe thinks she may have a plan. She can use the buildings air conditioning to flush out the nerve gas. Of course it'll flush it out into the general public, but hey, you win some, you lose some. The only problem with the plan is there's a computer on the far end of the building that's running a program that's blocking her from doing anything. Jack thinks if he uses the wall behind the situation room, that's free of gas, to get into a storage room, that's also free, he'll be able to hold his breath and go through one of the contaminated walls to get to that computer. No one thinks this is a particularly good idea since they don't trust Jack can hold his breath that long. Also, he'll have to get back into the storage room and wait another twenty seconds before Chloe flushes the room of the gas, before he can breathe again. Unfortunately, this is the only solution they have, since Curtis and the chemical team is still too far away. Why Chloe can flush that room and not the rest, I have no idea. I'm just going with it here.

Jack and the magical hoodie

Jack decides to go and heads out into the wall. He makes his way to the storage room, donning his black hood, which doesn't let any gas get in through the sides. Hey, I don't know, but he looks damn cute. When he gets into the storage room he tapes the entrance up so none of the gas leaks back to everyone else and informs Chloe that when he's back he'll tap the com three times, giving her the signal to flush the room. He makes sure his hood is on straight and takes a deep breath. Out in the contaminated area, he goes for the wall that leads into the computer room. He takes it off and comes up on bars, blocking his access to the room. He sees the computer and the program Chloe said it was running, but can't do anything. He heads back to the room.

"No need to be a biatch"

The computer tells Chloe the seals are deteriorating still and Kim wonders if they can do anything to help Jack. Like what? Breathe for him? Chloe gives her some smart ass comment, but unlike most people, Kim stands up to her. Chloe hears Jack's tapping and quickly starts venting the room he's in while he continues to hold his breath. They wonder why he's back so fast. When Audrey gives him the signal to breathe, he tells them about the access problem. Apparently there was a new addition to the floor plan and no one upgraded the schematics. Fortunately, that person's probably dead outside already anyway, so no harm, no foul. Chloe figures that the quickest and easiest way to the computer room is from McGill's holding cell.

Jack calls McGill and breaks the news to him. On the bright side, the people who called you incompetent will be alive, on the down side, you'll see your sister in the after life. Jack claims there's no way to vent the holding room, which means not only will McGill die, but so will the guard in the room. The guard doesn't like this plan but McGill convinces him that it'll save lives.

In the situation room Kim takes the time to apologize to Chloe. She wants to know if Jack was in contact with her while he was gone. Chloe says that he was, because she was feeding him information about Kim. He knew about Chase leaving her and her depression. Funny, because he reacted to it like it was the first he heard of it. Jack returns to the situation room and they pull up the live feed from the holding room.

McGill listens as the guard says goodbye to his daughter and says he'll be home later. Yeah, in a body bag. After he hangs up they hold their breath and McGill runs out to the computer room. He's able to disengage the program and goes back into the holding room. Why the hell doesn't he go in that little room Jack was in I don't know. Chloe's able to begin venting the air out. Unfortunately the air won't be breathable for another fifteen minutes. Let's see if McGill can hold his breath. Jack thanks them and lets them know that they've saved all of their lives. The guard can't hold his breath anymore, and sucks in a big gulp. At first there's no reaction, and then he starts convulsing and dies. McGill continues to hold his breath until he can't any longer. Unfortunately the air's still not clean so he keels over and dies as well. Everyone watches from the situation room.

Jack then remembers Henderson and pulls the feed back up. Tony's still sitting there with a gun and Henderson's still not responding. Since it doesn't look like Henderson will be giving up anything anytime soon, Jack tells Chloe to keep trying to get information off of his computer. Hey, didn't Kim used to do this for a living too? Why isn't she at a computer trying to help? I guess they only have that one in there. Jack then asks Kim to stay awhile after they get out of the situation room, so they can talk. She yells, "Are you crazy?". I mean who can blame her, CTU's not exactly a safe zone. She makes the observation that horrible things seem to happen when she's around him. Jack, hurt, goes over to the window and looks out. Audrey comes up behind him and takes his hand, comforting him.

Mike and Martha look over the press statement and wonder if Logan's gone off his rocker for good. Logan thinks it's a good plan, if they were on Mars. Mike excuses himself and Logan knows he's in deep doo doo. Martha tells him that she won't stand around wathing Gardner make a fool of him. She likes to watch him do it all on his own. He has a small breakdown after everything that's going on during the day. She comforts him.

Hey, this is what I'd rather be doing

Bierko calls a woman, Collette, who looks like a call girl. He wonders if the schematics are ready and she says that they aren't. He tries to demand them but she points out that she's the only one who's willing to give it up. The schematics I mean. After she hangs up she goes back to her boyfriend and mounts him. Oh, I'm gonna like this girl. She doesn't tell him what the call is about and doesn't seem to have any urgency to get those schematics to Bierko.

Karen talks to Bill and tells him that she's almost there with her team. After they hang up the nerd in the back tells her that he's formatted all of CTU's servers to match the Homeland Security specs and that their tactical protocol will go through him. Yeah, because Curtis is doing such a bad job. Tool. Karen tells him that he can replace anyone he wants on the CTU team since she's now the HBIC (Head Bitch In Charge).

Finally the sealed doors at CTU start opening. Not sure if I would trust that everything's alright, but everyone seems to believe it and starts heading back to their work stations. Jack says goodbye to Kim and pulls Barry aside. He tells him to get Kim the hell out LA and Barry agrees.

In with Henderson his nervous system is shutting down. Jack calls and they tell him that he's in a coma. Tony thinks this is the perfect opportunity. Jack starts a full sprint through CTU towards medical, pleading with Tony not to do anything. He claims it won't make him feel better about Michelle being dead. It'll make me feel better though.

Tony knocks the interrogator out and prepares a syringe of something to inject Henderson with. Why I don't know, he has a perfectly good gun in his hand. He stands over Henderson's comatosed body, ready to plunge the needle in. Unfortunately, he's a decent guy and can't do it. He hesitates, at which point frakin' Robocop wakes up and takes the needle, stabbing it in TONY'S chest!!! What the frakin' hell is going on!!! Henderson gets off of the table, takes the gun and runs out. Jack arrives then and finds Tony on the ground. With his last breath Tony tells him that he really didn't have much to live for anyway with Michelle dead. Then he... he... I can't even write it. He dies as Jacks hold him and cries!!! I have to wipe a few tears away as I write this.

NNNOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm spent. I can't do it anymore. The President, Michelle, Edgar, now Tony. I almost wanna give up. The only thing that saves me is knowing that now Jack's really pissed. He's gonna find Henderson if it's the last thing he does. And when he does find him, it's gonna be good.