Chuck Vs The Third Season – OD Bootleg Edition

'Guys! I know Kung-Fu.'

All three members gawked in disbelief at the carnage strewn across the stark white floor of the Intersect Room. Half a dozen Ring agents, each capable of taking Bartowski down with just a pinky, now looked like a kindergarten class on a nap break. The most animated member of Team Bartowski recovered first.

'Ha-hah! Did you guys see that? Whoa! Neo, eat your heart out!`, Chuck swept his arms around the room encompassing the fallen agents. `Six on one and I took them all out. Woohoo!` He then went through a flurry of moves moving with uncanny speed.

Casey and Sarah were still speechless and remained so, trying to take in Chuck`s impossible display of hand combat prowess. They exchange worried glances.

Sarah recovered first. `Chuck! Take it easy! You`re not physically trained to do that.`

Chuck giddy with his new found ability laughed manically. `Stop? No way! I`m Chuck-Fuing.

'Ow!', Chuck stumbled and clutched his shoulder.

`Chuck! What is it?`

`Ah, feeling a little bit stiff now. Oh not good. Not good.` Chuck bent over in pain. His face was bunched in grimaces as cramps spread throughout his body.

Casey grunted in amusement, `Hey moron. Get the cuff keys before you become totally useless.`

Chuck did the best he could as the cramping continued to spread throughout his body. He managed to find the keys and handed them to Sarah before he collapsed prone to the floor. Casey and Sarah quickly undid their cuffs.

Sarah raced to Chuck's side and knelt beside his prone figure. She rolled him onto his back and cupped his face. 'Chuck? Hey Chuck! You with me?'

Chuck's eye flickered open. 'Yeah,' he pushed out between clenched teeth.

'What is it? What's the matter?'

'Cramps. All over. Bad....'

' Hold on. I'll get some water.'

Casey loomed over her shoulder. He looked at Chuck with distaste. 'Well SuperSpy, if you were in any type of shape besides nerd, you probably wouldn't be having this problem.'

Sarah stood up forcing Casey to move back. 'Not now Casey. I'm going to get some water and aspirin. You might want to secure the agents before they wake up.'

Casey grunted. 'Heh, for all we know Chuck Lee here killed them all.'

Chuck spoke up at that. 'God, I hope not.'

'You go all Bruce Lee over these guys what do you expect? This isn't playtime anymore.'

'Casey,' Sarah warned him back.

Casey shook his head in disgust and moved off to check on the downed agents muttering about lady feelings and little boys playing cops and robbers in the real world. Sarah scurried off to find some painkillers. She found a first aid kit at the security desk and the needed item inside. Sarah filled a paper cup from a nearby water cooler cursing the seeming slowness with which the water flowed. The trip back to the Intersect Room was a battle between the speed Sarah moved versus the urgent drive of her concern for Chuck. The loser was the water that splashed over the edge of the cup.

Sarah forced herself to slow down enough to stop further loss but the reduced pace made her feel like she was balancing on a high wire instead of simple walking. In the room Chuck lay in the same spot, now curled into ball. She cupped Chuck's head at the back with one hand and tipped some water into his mouth. Chuck took a small sip and then took the aspirins that followed. The whole time the two of them held each other's gaze. No words were spoken. But an ocean of feelings passed between them. Stormy weather lay ahead.

Sarah laid Chuck's head back on the floor gently and brushed the hair back on his forehead. 'Better?'

Chuck tentatively flexed his hands and then his arms as he assessed himself. 'Yeah. Thanks. The cramps seem to be going away. Thank goodness.' He slowly uncurled and lay supine.

Casey had returned from inspection of the agents to catch that. 'Well ace, they're all alive. Most of them have a broken bone or two. The last one you put down has a couple of fractured ribs.'

Chuck let out a huge sigh of relief, 'Good.'

'So Bartowski, what's your deal?'

'What do you mean?'

'You. The Intersect. Why'd you upload it again? You spent the last two years moaning about getting your old life back and when you do, less than two days later you pop it back in your head.'

Leave it to Casey to bypass any delicacies and plow straight to the heart of the matter. Chuck stole a glance at Sarah and knew it was the number one question on her mind too. He sat up slowly and made a show of checking himself out to avoid giving an answer. Now was not the time and place for this. He stuck a hand out to Casey, who pulled Chuck up to his feet. Chuck tested his balance and faced his two handlers. 'I wish I had an answer for you. Things happened so fast. I'm still trying to sort it all out.'

Chuck could not help but look at the blood smear on the wall where Bryce had spent his last few moments. The stain stood out, a neon red question mark, against the pristine whiteness of the wall. Even though he was dead, Bryce showed that he too questioned Chuck's decision.

Casey gave Chuck that stone cold glare that always made Chuck feel so inconsequential. 'Well genius, you better sort out your lady feelings quick. Beckman ain't gonna be as understanding as we are.'

Casey's words and their tone belied his true feelings as he flanked Chuck on the other side from Sarah. Chuck and Sarah exchanged a fleeting but knowing look. Chuck took his first few tentative steps towards the exit like a new born penguin but waved his two guardians off from helping him.

It was less than twenty small, waddling steps to the hallway. Somewhere between the first and last step of that journey, the Chuck that started was not the same Chuck at the end. During his laboured sojourn, the events of the last few hours replayed back in Chuck's mind. A flash that was not a flash but the malleable and unmeasurable speed of consciousness accessing memory and thought; his proclamation of love for Sarah to his father, the decision to join the mission, finding entry into the Intersect room, the death of Bryce, mission moments of the last two years and then the epiphany.

In the debilitating backwash of the Intersect 2.0, the knowledge had been momentarily obscured. Now it was back. Chuck really did want to be a spy. No. It was more than that. Chuck had realized he was destined to be one. He had felt the surety of that moment when he had downloaded Intersect 2.0 before destroying it. All the pieces had been there before him. But he had ignored them in his dogged quest to regain control of his life. Control Chuck thought he had lost with the first Intersect. With his new found insight, Chuck now knew that control of his life had never been taken away from him. He had given it up; used the Intersect as a crutch for two years. Just like the previous five years when the crutch had been Stanford and Jill.

No more.

Chuck stopped short of the door and turned to take in the Intersect Room. The stark, monocoloured, bright whiteness of it all. It was like a clean slate to him. A new start. Casey and Sarah studied him quizzically. Chuck straightened his posture and drew back his shoulders. For an instant it seemed as if he had absorbed some of the latent ambience of the room. He seemed to increase in stature and substance.

Chuck looked at his handlers, his two friends, and smiled. 'Let's go talk to Beckman.'