a right hook, crushing the man’s throat. The waiter bounced off the wall and went down, gagging and gasping for breath.
Jack snatched the laptop off the desk and bolted for the door.
“Stop him,” the Albino cried.
Gold Teeth blocked his path, but Jack didn’t stop.
Crouched low, he slammed into the man. Together, they went through the door and over the restaurant’s balcony railing.
Jack was on top when they hit a table, smashing it. Crystal shattered, china broke, silverware flew. Jack flipped over, and lost his grip on the laptop. It slid across the hardwood floor.
Gold Teeth did a somersault, too, and landed beside him.
Jack knew the man was hurting, but Gold Teeth didn’t give up. He lunged as Jack scrambled across the debris-strewn floor, fumbling for the computer.
The kitchen doors parted and Petey returned, armed with his meat cleaver.
Jack gripped the laptop with both hands and brought it down on the back of Gold Teeth’s head. The man grunted and went limp. Jack looked up to see Petey charging.
Then the Albino started shooting and the dining room exploded in a shower of shattering glass as the massive front windows came down in a deadly hail. Jack rolled under a table as razor shards rained down around him.
Petey was struck, a two-foot icicle of glass piercing the top of his skull.
The Albino shifted fire, peppering the ceiling. The racing plane lurched on the wires, then one wing dipped.
Jack knew he was doomed unless he moved.
Tucking the laptop under his arm, he dived through the broken window. The suspended antique airplane came down a split-second later, smashing the tables and sending broken chairs and shattered china rolling onto the sidewalk.
Ears ringing from the noise, Jack stumbled to his feet, tightened his grip on the laptop, and took off. He wanted to go back for the Albino, but he was unarmed now, and he suspected the computer and its contents were more important.
As sirens wailed in the distance, Jack hailed a cab. On the ride back to CTU, his cell phone went off. Jack checked the number, took the call.
“Hi, honey,” Teri Bauer chirped.
“Hi, sweetheart.” Jack closed his eyes. The adrenaline was still pumping; he struggled to control his tone, make everything sound all right. “It’s nice to hear your voice.”
Teri laughed. “It’s only been a day, but it’s nice to know you’re missing me already.”
“I am.”
“Listen, Jack, I know it’s early, but I wanted to call anyway. I didn’t wake you, did I?”
“I’m up,” Jack replied. “It’s actually not that early here.”
“Oh, of course, that’s right. The time difference. Well, Kim wanted me to ask a favor. She wants a Coldplay poster from the MTV store. Apparently it’s in Times Square.
That’s where they do their live TRL shows — at least that’s what Kim told me. You’ll do that, won’t you?”
“Yeah. Sure.” Jack glanced at the passing traffic, exhaled at the idea of something so normal, so easy. Buying a poster to make his daughter happy. He smiled. “Anything I can get for you?”
“No, honey. Just bring yourself home in one piece.
Okay? Stay safe.”
“I’ll try,” said Jack. “Things here… they’re a little…
disorganized. But I won’t forget Kim’s poster.”
“Great,” said Teri. “I have to get going, but how’s New York otherwise? Did you go to any nice restaurants yet?”
“Actually,” said Jack, “I just came from one.”
When he finished rerouting the security links, Tony Almeida closed the panel and rebooted the system. While he waited through the startup procedures, Tony popped the top buttons of his black cotton shirt to cool off. Then he began the laborious process of enabling all the new network connections he’d just established, one link at a time.
Alarms. Motion sensors. Elevator overrides; all had to be restarted. While he worked, Tony unconsciously rubbed the ragged scar across his chest.
The “program enabled” icon appeared, and soon Tony had real-time images on all twelve security monitors. He observed the parking garage, the lobby, the elevator shaft, the roof, the fire escape through an array of cameras.
“Mr. Almeida?”
Rachel Delgado was there, a Styrofoam cup of coffee in each hand. Tony’s shirt still gaped, and the woman’s eyes widened when she saw Tony’s scar.
“My god,” she cried. “Did that just happen?”
Tony flushed, closed his shirt. “No,” he muttered, buttoning quickly. “It, uh… happened a couple months ago.
Down in Mexico.”
Rachel looked away. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry. You were working behind the console, and it looked like an electrical burn, so I thought…”
“It is an electrical burn,” Tony replied.
Rachel suddenly remembered the containers in her hand. “I brought you some coffee,” she said. “I didn’t know if you liked it black or with cream, so I brought one of each.”
“Thanks,” Tony said, accepting the black. “Sit down.
Join me.”
“Okay,” Rachel said, glancing at the workstation. “Wow, you have everything running again.”
“Almost everything.”
“Is that Con Ed guy on the roof helping you?” Rachel asked.
Tony’s eyes were on the monitor. He’d seen the man in a blue utility worker’s uniform, too, just before the guy had moved out of camera range.
Tony punched up the digital control panel for the roof camera. Using his mouse to move the lens from side to side, Tony scanned the black tarred roof. Soon he spotted the man again — he
“He looks busy,” Rachel observed.
The man’s back was turned. He was crouched at the base of one of CTU’s microwave towers, tinkering with something impossible to see.
Tony frowned. He’d established the network connection to the motion detectors on the roof two minutes ago. Why hadn’t those detectors gone off, sounded an alarm that someone was on the roof? He checked the circuit and got a
“network connection lost” message.
Adrenaline pumping, Tony checked the alarm system and received the same warning. Someone had sabotaged the system as fast as he’d gotten it running.
“What’s the matter?” Rachel asked. “You look upset.”
Tony jerked his head at the monitor. “The Con Edison guy on the roof. He’s an intruder.”
Rachel rose abruptly, spilling her coffee on the concrete floor. “Oh my god. What do we do?”
Tony reached for the phone.
