Manhattan - Ex-con Victor Aruz enters a tenement, observed by a Russian spotter who is reporting via Bluetooth on Victor's whereabouts. Victor finds his colleague Manny dead in the shower, a bullet hole in his forehead.
He pulls out a gun and calls a woman who is surrounded by NYPD detectives. He asks for Mauricio. The woman, distraught, says he's dead, killed the same way. Who did this? Victor's already hung up, alert and avoiding the windows. And indeed, there's a Russian sniper on the roof, waiting for him. Victor slips into the alley, where he steals a car. The sniper spots him and manages to shoot him in the shoulder. Victor gets away, but the spotter gets the license plate and calls the police to report the car as stolen.
Jack awakens in his apartment, a little girl on his lap - his granddaughter, Teri. She calls him Jack, and he reminds her to call him grandpa. She asks him to switch the channel on the TV to a better cartoon. As he flips channels, he gets distracted by a news report about mideast peace negotiations on which President Taylor's legacy may rest. Teri asks again for a cartoon, and Jack, smiling and apparently content, complies. Kim calls; she and her husband Stephen are going to be late getting home due to traffic around the UN building caused by security for the negotiations. They each say that Teri reminds them of each other. After the call, Kim is worried. She asked Jack about moving to L.A. the night they arrived and he hasn't said a word on the subject since.
At the UN, President Taylor and Ethan Kanin sit opposite Omar Hassan, President of the Islamic Republic of Kamistan, and his younger brother, Kamistanian Foreign Minister Farhad Hassan. Hassan will agree to foreswear the pursuit of nuclear missiles, subject to permanent inspection, but an impasse is reached when Taylor insists on American inspectors rather than an international team. Farhad is angered, but Hassan calms him. Taylor wants this issue resolved before the press conference, which is in less than an hour. They adjourn, and Kanin is shocked when Taylor says to find a way to give Hassan what he wants. Hassan is a once-in-a-lifetime leader. He's already suspended support for terrorist organizations and privately advocates for a two-state solution. He can't reasonably stick his neck out much farther.
Jack and Teri meet Kim and Stephen in the lobby of Jack's building, and Jack says he wants to be part of Teri's life. He'll move to L.A. He's already nearly packed; he'll fly back to L.A. with them tonight. Kim is overwhelmed and overjoyed. As Jack bundles Teri into the car with her parents, he is observed from across the street by Victor, huddled in his car and dripping blood. As Jack re-enters his building, Victor grabs a gun and gets out of his car.
As Chief of Staff Rob Weiss begins to call the press conference to order, reporter Meredith Reed finds that her press credentials have been revoked. Meanwhile, in their suite, Farhad reports that the Americans will allow the international inspectors, on the condition that the head of the team be an American. Hassan can live with that. Farhad thinks they've already surrendered too much in the name of peace. Hassan says that their nuclear pursuits are bankrupting them. President Taylor is offering billions in aid. Farhad thinks it's a trick. Hassan's phone rings; it's Meredith. Their conversation is oddly intimate, and he agrees to restore her press credentials, as well as confirming their private interview after the press conference. It transpires they were revoked by Farhad, who thinks that Hassan is courting disaster back home; he is married, but obviously has feelings for this woman. Their people will think he has been corrupted by the West.
Victor arrives at Jack's door, asking for help. Jack says he doesn't work for the government anymore, but Victor says there's a plot to assassinate Hassan, today, before the agreement can be signed. Victor got the hitter into the country, but now he's turned on him and the others who helped him, and Victor wants to cut a deal in exchange for information. He claims not to know the hitter's name, but knows how to find him. Jack, angry to be dragged back into this world, tells Victor he better be telling the truth.
At the new, high-tech CTU in New York, Cole Ortiz, the new head of Field Ops, speaks with fiancee and co-worker Dana Walsh about the security arrangements at the UN, as well as arrangements for the wedding... though that part of the conversation is somewhat awkward. Dana then assists a frustrated Chloe with the new computers. Dana's perfectly nice, but Chloe's resentful that she needs help. As Dana moves off, Jack calls and asks to talk to the new director, Brian Hastings. Chloe says he doesn't like to be disturbed, but when Jack fills her in, she walks right into his office. Hastings takes the call. He's dubious, especially when he hears that Victor wants CTU protection and immunity. CTU isn't the organization Jack knew. However, he changes his tone when Jack tells him that if Hassan is killed, he'll tell President Taylor that Hastings ignored his intel. He arranges to send a chopper to pick up Jack and Victor from a helipad nine blocks away from Jack's place.
Elsewhere in CTU, 20 year old Arlo Glass, an overconfident computer geek, uses surveillance satellites to spy on sunbathing women. Cole approaches and warns Arlo that he's risking getting fired if Hastings ever catches him. Arlo is unrepentant. Hastings enters and asks for the chopper for Jack. Arlo doesn't know who Jack is; the others are stunned at his ignorance, but quickly move on with the preparations. As Jack and Victor exit his apartment, the police have found the vehicle Victor stole. Elsewhere, in a secret lair, the spotter and the sniper listen in on the police report, along with their boss, Davros. Now they have Victor's location. They promise that Victor's a dead man, but they're obviously on thin ice with Davros.
Kanin tells an overjoyed President Taylor that Hassan agreed to their proposals. Weiss enters; he's just talked to Hastings. He reports on the plot against Hassan and asks Taylor for authorization for Victor's immunity. Weiss wants to inform Hassan now. Kanin thinks they can't; Hassan will leave out of concern for his own safety. Weiss, aggressively pushing his point, says that if Hassan finds out later that they had this intel and hid it from him, all the trust they've build up will be lost. Taylor says she'll think about it. Outside the room, Weiss finds Kanin, his hands shaking, taking a pill from a prescription bottle. Weiss apologizes for being so hard on him, but Kanin, smiling, says he recommended Weiss for the job precisely because he's not afraid to speak up.
At CTU, Hastings tells Chloe that she's obviously only at this job because her husband was downsized. She spends all her time on the phone with her child. She'd rather be home. Chloe protests she needs this job. Hastings understands, but if she doesn't shape up, she may want to "rethink" working at CTU. Meanwhile, Cole gets on the chopper with field agent Torres, who tells him he'd better set a date - Dana's getting cold feet. Elsewhere, Jack props up a weakening Victor as he calls Kim and tells her he'll be late; he'll meet them at the airport. He insists nothing's wrong. Victor collapses. Jack inspects him in the alley; he's bleeding profusely. As Jack tries to compress the wound, a parking attendant spies them... and dials 911.
Hassan's wife, Dalia, and daughter, Kayla, prepare for the press conference. Hassan arrives. She is cold to him. Meanwhile, Meredith passes through security and thanks Farhad, who tells her to stay away from Hassan unless she wants to destroy everything he's worked for. In the conference room, Weiss is shocked to find that Taylor has decided not to tell Hassan about the threat. Hassan arrives, and Weiss begins briefing them on the format of the press conference.
Meanwhile, as Jack helps Victor back to his feet, a pair of New York cops arrive. Jack explains he's working on CTU's behalf. The cops, dubious, say they'll call in for verification. Suddenly, the spotter and sniper arrive, armed with machine guns. The officers are killed, but Jack and Victor manage to duck into a nearby building. Jack calls Chloe; the chopper is two minutes away. He speaks to Cole; they arrange for a pickup on the roof of the parking structure next door. Jack ambushes the spotter with a fire axe, and throws the sniper over the stairwell's railing. They're dead. The chopper arrives and Jack smashes through a window to jump to the adjacent building's roof. Jack hands Victor over to Cole, who asks Jack to come back to CTU for debriefing, but Jack says he has a plane to catch. Suddenly, Jack sees a flash of light from a nearby rooftop. It's a missile - fired, we see, by Davros. The chopper is blown to bits.
As Chloe desperately tries to re-establish contact, Jack demands that a badly hurt Victor tell him what he knows. Victor says that the hitter has someone on the inside, someone who knows Hassan, but he dies before he can give any more information. Back at the UN, Meredith is secretively speaking on the phone to somebody. "I know I'm behind schedule," she says, while coldly looking at Hassan's face on a giant TV in the UN Plaza, "but it'll get done."
