Hyoscine-pentothal

Hyoscine and sodium pentothal are two different drugs in real life. Neither causes pain.

Hyoscine-pentothal is a fictional pain-inducing drug that appears in the television series 24. It has been exclusively used by CTU agents as part of their time-sensitive interrogation procedure.

Its name may have been a hasty script-writer's concoction from the name of the two real drugs hyoscine and sodium pentothal, which the CIA sometimes uses as "truth drugs". Although perhaps intended to imply a mixture of the two real drugs, the fictional drug has no apparent relationship to the effects of either of the two real drugs in the real world.

The drug first appeared in Day 4 when it was administered on Richard Heller, Sarah Gavin and Behrooz Araz during interrogation. It was used again for interrogation Day 5, when Christopher Henderson, a terrorist captured by CTU, is tortured by an agent who repeatedly injects him with the drug several times. Ultimately, however, the torture proves ineffective, despite the session lasting for over an hour. Agent Tony Almeida is later stabbed with a syringe containing an apparent overdose of the drug.

In Day 6, Jack Bauer uses hyoscine-pentothal to interrogate his brother Graem in a similar manner, and the session proves somewhat fruitful, as he reveals his connection to the death of David Palmer. Phillip Bauer later uses it to kill Graem.

Effects

A number of characters have described the effects of the drug. CTU Agent Curtis Manning claims that it makes every nerve ending in one's body "feel like it is on fire". Other characters comment that Christopher Henderson withstood "an inhuman amount of pain" during his interrogation session.

Jack, a past victim of torture, further reveals that a 7cc dose of hyoscine-pentothal will result in "indescribable pain", while an 8cc dose is enough to run the risk of inducing cardiac arrest. However the actual mechanisms that describe how the drug actually works have not been revealed yet.

Jack summarizes the drug to his brother Graem Bauer as a "neural inflammatory."