"Watch you tone, puta puta..."

"Enough," Pizarro cried, silencing his brother. "This woman has helped us so far. She has earned our respect."

Balboa sneered, but said nothing. A moment later the doors opened onto a long hallway. At the end of the corridor, an open door revealed the restaurant's busy kitchen. They heard voices, the clatter of pots and pans.

"Come on," Stella whispered. "And be quick about it."

She led them to door marked EMPLOYEES ONLY. They entered an empty break room, and an adjacent room with a coffee pot, microwave oven, and vending machines lining the wall. Stella took them to another door. Seemingly unused, it was blocked by a row of fibergla.s.s chairs.

"It's a dead end," Balboa grunted.

"Wrong, amigo," Stella said. She slid the chairs aside with her dainty foot and pushed the door open, just a crack. The room beyond was small, filled with white starched chef and wait staff uniforms hanging on metal racks.

"Why are we here?" Pizarro asked.

"To see her," Stella whispered, pushing the door wider.

Alone in the uniform room, a ten year old girl sat at a metal table, her back to the open door. She did not notice their presence because music from an MP3 filled her ears. Humming along with a tune by Hilary Duff, Pamela Sheridan scribbled in a coloring book, crayons littering the table top.

"What is this about, woman?" Pizarro said doubtfully.

"I told you. My roommate, Lilly, is a waitress at the banquet tonight. She gave me a ride to Bix's garage earlier today, told me some sob story about how she was stuck for a babysitter and planned to stash the kid in this closet for the evening..."

"And this helps us how?" Balboa demanded.

Stella rolled her eyes. "Hold the rug rat hostage, and I guarantee you Lilly Sheridan will do anything you ask. To save that kid, she'll plant those bombs herself if she has to."

10:28:04 p.m. PDT The Cha-Cha Lounge, Las Vegas Morris...o...b..ian was glued to the television screen. Five minutes before, he'd watched Don Driscoll open the back door to admit the six-man hit team. Once inside, Driscoll led the urban punks down three flights of stairs to the subbas.e.m.e.nt.

Now Morris watched as Jack Bauer, a Glock cradled in his right hand, slipped through that same door and locked it behind him. Driscoll and the hit team were trapped in the cellar. Morris knew those men wouldn't be leaving, unless it was feet first.

Switching to the security camera in the stairwell, Morris watched as Bauer crept down the steps, paused on a landing. To Morris, Jack seemed to be listening to the whispered words of the hit team as they moved toward the security room.

Bauer glanced up at the camera, then reached around a thick pipe to retrieve the device he'd hidden there earlier. Jack slipped the AN/PVS-14 night vision goggles over his head, adjusted the straps, then fitted the monocular image intensifying unit over his left eye.

When Jack looked up again, his elaborate night vision gear reminded Morris of a half-human cyborg from a science fiction novel.

In his right he still clutched the Glock. Jack raised his left, palm open.

At the prearranged signal, O'Brian cut the electricity. Regretfully, his television screen went dark, too. He reasoned the cameras wouldn't pick up much without the lights anyway. Morris sighed. He might be blind, but so was the hit team.

"Good luck, Jacko," he muttered.

Immediately, Morris felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked up, blinked in surprise.

A woman loomed over him, her complexion bone white, with a foamy crown of blacker-than-black hair topping her high forehead. Sharp cheekbones accentuated large eyes, but her face was dominated by a wide, scarlet mouth. In her ubiquitous black blouse and slacks, Nina Myers reminded O'Brian of the Angel of Death from the stories about the 1918 influenza epidemic his grand mum told him.

"What are you doing here?" Morris demanded. His tone was sharp - he was still rattled by the drama unfolding in the bas.e.m.e.nt.

"Nice to see you too, Morris," Nina replied, hand on her hip.

"How... How did you get here?"

"Actually, I took a cab from the airport."

"I... I didn't mean to ask how you got here," Morris stammered. "I meant to ask why you're here."

Nina's scarlet lips dipped into a pout. "Alberta Green sent me. She's shutting down the operation. This investigation is over, effective immediately. I'm here to supervise the deactivation..."

Morris slumped in the chair, absorbing the news.

Nina pushed her hair back. "Look, I need to see Jack right away."

"Sorry, love, you'll have to wait," Morris replied with a crooked grin. "I'm afraid Agent Bauer's rather busy right now."

10:37:30 p.m. PDT Babylon Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas The desserts were dished up, the coffee served. The second round of after dinner speeches, including the keynote address by Senator David Palmer, was about to begin.

Evelyn Ankers interrupted Lilly Sheridan at table six and send her to the beverage pantry to fetch pitchers of distilled ice water for the speaker's podium.

As she crossed the crowded banquet hall, the cell phone in Lilly's skirt pocket vibrated. She waited until she was in the wings and out of sight to before answering, lest the authoritarian banquet manager catch her on a personal call. Finally Lilly reached a quiet alcove near the rest rooms and reached for the phone. Along with the cell she pulled someone's business card out of her pocket. Lilly immediately checked the caller's number. As she feared, the call came from her daughter.

"Pamela, I told you not to call me unless..."

"Shut up and listen for once, Lilly. I have a gentleman here who wants to speak with you."

"Stella? Is that you? Where's Pamela? What's the mat..."

A man's accented voice interrupted her. "Lilly Sheridan, listen carefully. We have your daughter. She's safe as long as you follow our instructions."

Icy hands seemed to squeeze the breath out of Lilly's lungs. "I don't understand. Is this some kind of sick joke..."

"It's no joke, honey." Stella again. "We're here in the uniform storage room where you stashed your kid. Pamela's safe. It's up to you to see that she stays that way. Here, talk to your mom, cuddle bunny."

Lilly strained to hear over the noisy crowd. "Mom. I'm scared. Aunt Stella is acting weird and..."

"That's enough," Stella Hawk interrupted. "In a couple of minutes, a guy's going to show up in front of the kitchen door. He'll be pushing a serving cart with flowers on it. That's Carlos. He'll tell you what to do."

"Stella, why are you doing this?"

"Shut up, Lil. I can't stand it when you whine."

Stella hung up.

Trembling, Lilly lowered the phone, leaned against a pillar to keep from falling down. She twisted her head to face the kitchen door, but saw no one pushing a flower cart. Fumbling to put away her phone, Lilly realized she was clutching something in her left hand - Jaycee Jager's business card. She stared at the number scrawled on the back, her mind racing. Jager was Stella's boyfriend. Could he have something to do with what was happening? Somehow she didn't think so, but Lilly realized Jaycee might know something.

Crouching out of sight behind the coffee station, Lilly quickly punched in Jaycee's number.

10:41:00 p.m. PDT The Cha-Cha Lounge, Las Vegas When the lights went out, Jack heard the gang's cries of alarm. He listened while Don Driscoll tried to calm them, insisting the power failure was just a glitch.

But it was their leader, the man called Wildman, who finally restored order. Despite his outlandish appearance, Wildman seemed to know what he was doing. That was unfortunate. Jack a.s.sumed that when the lights failed, the gang would panic, maybe scatter. He could easily gun them down one by one. But since they stuck together, the hit team had a better chance of stopping Jack before he got them all.

Bauer crept down the remaining steps. With the night vision equipment, he could clearly see the men in the corridor - white blobs in a field of green, twenty feet away. Their guns were drawn, and they had formed a defensive circle. Jack was willing to wait for a better shot, because it would be difficult to take them down now.

Then Jack saw Don Driscoll reach into his pocket. When his hand came out again, the man was clutching a flashlight pointed in Jack's direction. Like it or not, the time for Jack to strike had come.

Aiming with both hands, Jack stepped away from the wall and fired. The first shot took out the man with the shotgun. He tumbled to the concrete floor. The second shot slammed into the man with the Raiders cap, threw him backwards in a gush of blood. His fall left a man in a hooded jacket exposed, and Jack shot him next. The man reeled but didn't go down, so Jack shot him again.

The man with the cornrows stepped behind Don Driscoll. Jack paused, unwilling to risk hitting his pit boss. He shifted his aim and took down the other three hit men in quick succession, each with a tap to the head.

A flash exploded in Jack's night vision goggles as Wildman opened fire. Tracers lit the walls as they tore down the corridor. Silhouetted in the muzzle flash, Jack saw Don Driscoll drop. The leader of the hit team was exposed now, and Jack fired his last round. Wildman slammed into the wall and slid to the floor, the top of his head blown away.

Jack stepped over a dead man to reach Don Driscoll. He didn't have to check the body to know the man was dead. Wildman's random shots had cut Don Driscoll's body in half.

Jack cursed. He'd hoped to grill the man about Hugo Bix's next move. Holstering the Glock, Jack reached into his back pocket for his cell, pressed speed dial.

"O'Brian," Morris answered.

"It's over," Jack announced. "Give me some lights down here..."

The lights sprang on a moment later. The grotesque scene was not improved by the harsh fluorescent glare.

"Jack, could you come upstairs. We have another development," said Morris.

Jack touched his forehead, looked away from the dead men sprawled on the floor. "I'll be right up."

Jack closed the cell phone - and it chirped immediately. He checked the display, didn't recognize the number.

"Jaycee," he answered.

"Jaycee! What is Stella doing? Why is she threatening to hurt my daughter?"

"Lilly, is that you? Slow down. What's going on?"

"Some man, with Stella. They're here at the Babylon. They've got my daughter, Jaycee! They say they'll hurt her if I don't do what they want..."

Jack's mind raced. There was something at the Babylon tonight... He'd seen it in the daily threat report. An anti-drug conference with VIP guests.

"Where are you right now?" Jack cried.

"I'm in the ballroom, the speeches are about to start. I..."

Suddenly the line went dead. Jack tried for a signal, got one immediately. He hit redial and after three rings, was transferred to Lilly's voice mail. Jack raced down the corridor and took the stairs two at a time.

10:46:01 p.m. PDT Babylon Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas Curtis stomped on the gas pedal, crashed the Dodge Sprinter through the security gate at the entrance to the hotel's underground parking garage. Over the squeal of tires, Curtis heard the guard's shouted commands to halt.

Good, he thought. he thought. That got their attention. That got their attention.

He circled the first level of the parking garage, looking for the other truck bombs. He realized only then that there were six levels to this parking garage, enough s.p.a.ce for thousands of cars, light trucks, and SUVs. He could never find the bombs in time. Not without help.

Curtis skidded to a halt, s.n.a.t.c.hed the shotgun off the seat and jumped out of the truck. He'd spied a fire alarm box near the elevators. Curtis broke the gla.s.s with the b.u.t.t of the shotgun and pressed the red b.u.t.ton.

The teeth rattling sound of a dozen alarm bells filled the garage. Covering his ears, Curtis moved on to another alarm box and smashed it open.

He knew that triggering the fire alarms was an act of desperation. Curtis did it because he'd run out of options. For the last hour, he'd experienced the deja vu feeling he was trapped in one of those nightmares he'd experienced as a child, dreams where you try to make an important phone call but keep messing up the numbers, or you try to yell for help and can't find your voice. Curtis had never felt more ineffectual or more isolated.

The irony was that ten minutes after he left the dead cops, Curtis believed his problems were solved. He steered the truck into a strip mall where he'd spotted an all night liquor store with a pay phone under its sign. Standing in the neon's glare, Curtis punched in the ten digit emergency phone number to CTU, a number unique to this current operation. He hoped to reach Jamey Farrell or Milo Pressman, convince them to issue a Code Red and dispatch emergency teams to the Babylon.

Instead, Curtis was connected to an electronic voice telling him the number he called was no longer in service. He hung up and called again, fearing he'd erred in the dialing. Curtis nearly smashed the receiver when he got the same taped message a second time.

He cursed loudly, causing the winos on the corner to give him a wide berth. Curtis realized something bad had happened. Someone back at CTU headquarters - Ryan Chappelle, George Mason, Alberta Green, or maybe Richard Walsh or Henderson himself - had shut them down with extreme prejudice. The Vegas operation was in the throes of deactivation, a bureaucratic mess that left Curtis without any access to CTU. It was a Draconian move usually reserved for missions that had been compromised: when an agent broke the law, or leaked intelligence, or there was a catastrophic threat and the field agents had to be recalled.

What could have happened? Curtis wondered. Curtis wondered. Did headquarters learn about Max Farrow's death, and the fact that Jack was hiding the murder from his superiors? Did headquarters learn about Max Farrow's death, and the fact that Jack was hiding the murder from his superiors?

Curtis realized that might be enough to warrant deactivation, but who would talk? He didn't, and he was d.a.m.n sure Morris could keep a secret, too.

But there was no use speculating. Whatever happened to trigger deactivation, Curtis was now effectively on his own. CTU wouldn't recognize his operational codes, even if he called the number listed in the phone book and tried to explain who he was and what was happening. As far as his superiors were concerned, he, Jack, Morris, and probably Tony Almeida at Groom Lake, were all compromised. They would have to be thoroughly debriefed by their superiors before they were reinstated and their security clearances restored.

Clutching the receiver in a death grip, Curtis dialed O'Brian's number at the Cha-Cha. He was shocked to get the man's voice mail. What could Morris be doing that was more important than monitoring the activities of the field agents?

Probably establishing deactivation protocols with whoever showed up to shut us down, Curtis mused bitterly. He left a message outlining what was going on, then hung up.

Curtis considered calling 911 and reporting an anonymous bomb threat. But in the end he vetoed the idea. It would only cause more chaos. Better if he was on the scene, Curtis decided. He could do more at the hotel.

After that he drove directly to the Babylon and began setting off the fire alarms, hoping to bring the authorities. But as he sprinted toward the elevator, Curtis stopped in his tracks. Three armed men in security uniforms blocked his path. Someone shouted. Even over the shrill, constant clang of the alarm bells, Curtis heard the words clearly.

"Drop the shotgun or we'll shoot."

10:55:21 p.m. PDT Hanging Gardens Ballroom Babylon Hotel and Casino, Las Vegas All eyes were on the podium. In the glare of a spotlight, Congressman Larry Bell commenced his introduction of the keynote speaker with a rambling account of a moment the two men shared back when they were both pro basketball players.

Lilly tried to call Jaycee Jager again, but she could not get a signal. She tried a pay phone next, but it seemed to be out of order. There was no tone, and all she heard was white noise.

Approaching the kitchen, Lilly spotted a man in a waiter's uniform standing beside a wheeled cart strewn with flowers. She approached the stranger warily, intimidated by his intense gaze. When Lilly was within arm's length, he seized her wrist.

"Do you wish to see your daughter again?" he hissed, his hot breath on her face.

Lilly nodded and the man released her.

"Wheel this cart to a spot behind the speaker's podium, there..." he gestured with a jerk of his head. "In front of that row of flags."