Moments after discovering his daughter, Kimberly, has snuck out of the house, Jack Bauer is called into work. As head of the CIA's Los Angeles Counter Terrorist Unit office he's told that an assassination attempt will be made within the next 24 hours on the life of presidential candidate David Palmer and it's up to his team of agents to keep Palmer alive. Meanwhile, Jack's wife, Teri, sets out to find their daughter.

Jack follows the arrested shooter to the police station in hopes of interrogating him only to find that Mason has arrived and taken control of the situation. But when the shooter says he will talk only to Jack, Jack learns he must break the shooter out of jail in order to learn who has kidnapped Kimberly. Back at the hotel, Senator Palmer learns more about the threatened news leak that could hurt his campaign.