After, Before, Always
Between A Phone And A Bomb
"Sarah, do you love me?"
Her mind begins to whirl.
She is sitting next to him, watching his heart break as her mind continues to careen mercilessly
She sees the storefront of the Buy More, a little girl in a pink tutu curtsying for an unconventional audience, a bouquet wrapped in brown paper, a margarita with two red straws, his amazed and slightly confused eyes as she dances around him; and above all, she sees him sprawled on the pavement, bits of the Nerd Herder littered around him. She can see the panic on his face as he lays there, in obvious danger of the coming vehicle. He, however, is only looking at her, not seeming to realize that his own death is perilously close to finding him.
"Sarah, look out!" echoes in her ears as she chances looking back up at Chuck.
His face has crumpled. He's mumbling something about being in his underwear and holding a plastic guitar, but she doesn't even comprehend it.
"Yes."
"I should probably go put some pants on."
"No, Chuck," she says, her voice stronger this time. "Yes."
He stares at her. He looks like a man seeing the sun for the first time, and, although he finds it beautiful, can't quite understand what it is.
"Wh-what?"
"Chuck, I fell for you a long, long time ago - after you fixed my phone and before you started diffusing bombs with computer viruses, so…yes."
A full-blown Bartowski smile is blooming on his face, and she lives for that smile. So even though she is terrified of being so vulnerable, she says it again.
"Yes."
"So you think this kid's got the Intersect?"
Sarah was very accustomed to the fact that men stared at her. In fact, at the moment, she was fully aware that every man in her general vicinity had their eyes trained on her backside as she sashayed into the generic electronics conglomerate.
If there was one thing she would never question, it was that men were astoundingly predictable.
"That's right, Agent Walker," replied the intelligence officer. "He's connected to Bryce Larkin."
Sarah steeled herself against the name. Not now. No time. Keep it together.
"Weaknesses?" she asked, keeping her tone as cold and officious as possible.
"Bright, but an underachiever. Lonely. Had his heart broken recently."
She paused, narrowing her eyes.
"I'm downloading his picture now."
Sarah looked down at her phone, where a photo of a rather sheepish employee was now featured. Easy enough, she calculated, taking note of his boyish haircut and wan face. There was nothing remarkable about the picture.
The blonde agent took a few steps. Her well-trained eyes immediately placed him in the store. He was standing behind a desk, a phone in the crook of his neck, wearing the same outfit and the same naiveté as the image now stored on her SIM card.
"Piece of cake," she smirked, swapping her real phone for the cheap model she needed to have 'repaired.' She sauntered forward, making sure to cock her head to the side and exaggerate the swing of her hips. She watched in satisfaction as she heard the man in the green shirt next to the desk begin to mutter to her mark.
"Stop the presses! Who is that? Vicki Vale…" said the man, who seemed to get shorter as she stalked closer.
Sarah almost lost her concentration when the mark began to rap the unfamiliar name. Is that a porn star? Probably. Predictable.
Even if it was kind of…entertaining.
There was a bit more sincerity in her smile than she realized when the mark did a double take and dropped the phone receiver with a clang.
"I hope I'm not interrupting anything."
The mark blinked stupidly. "No, not…at…all…that, uh - it's from, it's from Batman."
Sarah's face morphed into incredulity.
"'Cause that makes it better."
The mark laughed nervously and fiddled with his skinny gray tie. The shorter man in the green shirt leaned forward, as if trying to edge toward her.
"Uh, hi - hey, I'm Morgan," he said, in what he must have thought was a winning tone. "And this is, uh - this is Chuck."
"Wow, I didn't think people still named their kids Chuck…" she glanced back at her mark, who was gulping and wiping what must have been sweaty palms on the legs of his pants. "Or Morgan, for that matter."
The mark suddenly seemed to regain his nerve. She was surprised when he spoke with a charm she wouldn't have guessed he possessed.
"My parents are sadists," he said with a slight grin. "And carnival freaks found him in a dumpster."
"But they raised me as one of their own," said Morgan, his eyes wide in earnest.
Sarah quirked an eyebrow at him until Chuck broke into the conversation again.
"How can I help you -"
"Sarah," she supplied, the pseudonym rolling off her tongue easily.
"Sarah?" he finished.
"I'm here about this." She pushed the cell phone toward him on the counter.
"Oh, yeah, the Intellicell. Yeah, absolutely."
The mark - Chuck, she told herself suddenly - picked up the phone and immediately set to fixing it. She couldn't help but admire his well-hidden confidence as he continued.
"Uh, this model has a little screw that pops loose in the back here. Just give it a couple of quick turns - and - good as new." He looked up at her, that half-grin back on his face. "No problem."
She berated herself when she realized she had been staring at him.
"Wow, you geeks are good," she replied, clawing her way back under her cover. Keep it together, Walker.
But her cover slipped again as they both began to protest, motioning toward the Nerd Herd sign and shrugging, as if it didn't really matter to either one of them what they were called. A real smile slipped out again before she could restrain it.
"Excuse me, excuse me," interrupted a slightly hysterical voice. Sarah was annoyed she had to tear her eyes away from Chuck in order to see the speaker: a panicked father standing next to her, brandishing a video camera, a little girl in a pink tutu, and an adamant affirmation that he had done nothing wrong.
"Okay, okay, we'll just take a look and - you don't have a tape in here," faltered Chuck, looking up from the camera to the man.
"But it's digital," came the blank reply.
Morgan rolled his eyes. "Oh, boy."
"Right. Yes. But you still need digital tape."
"Oh, no," the man almost whimpered, as his mini ballerina daughter hung her head in disappointment. "Her mom is going to kill me."
Chuck pressed his lips together, thinking. He glanced at Sarah, who couldn't help but give him a small smile.
"Uh, Morgan - I need the Wall."
"It's yours." Morgan was off like a shot, leaving them at the help desk.
Chuck turned to Sarah, and she knew she needed to leave as soon as possible when she found herself noticing that his eyes were a particularly warm hue of dark hazel. What the hell is wrong with you, Walker?
"I'm so sorry," he apologized, and motioned for the father and daughter to follow him to the back of the store.
Agent Walker was glad for the respite from his presence as he walked away. She shook her head slightly, as if to clear it, before craning her neck to watch him as he positioned the video camera and showed the little girl where to stand. The picture on her phone really didn't do him justice, she thought, as she watched him say something kind to the girl, who smiled and nodded. He was tall - dark-haired - and, as she observed him smiling widely and applauding the sweet, impromptu performance, much more handsome than she had given him credit for.
Chuck turned around to look over where she was still standing. She plastered a quick smile on her face, too aware of how she must have looked, scrutinizing him from across the room. He smiled again, this time concentrating the expression solely on her, and Sarah's fight-or-flight instinct kicked in.
Flight. Definitely flight.
She said a prayer of thanksgiving to whatever higher being was listening for the distraction of a short, balding fellow employee accosting Chuck as she made her escape. Sarah left a card on the counter and haphazardly made her way to the door.
Out, get out, get out now, she thought frantically, almost tripping over her left high heel as she stopped on the sunny sidewalk right outside the door.
Maybe Graham was right. Maybe this is too soon after…she started walking again, blocking the name her heart had been screaming at her for the past few weeks from her mind. She opened her car door, sat down in the driver's seat, and rested her forehead on the steering wheel. This was supposed to be a simple intelligence assignment. No kills, no complicated situations. Just getting information from a naïve geek who craved female attention. It should have been easy. It should have been predictable.
She had been expecting predictable. Hell, she needed predictable.
And Chuck Bartowski was turning out to be anything but.
The ride to the restaurant was becoming increasingly difficult for Sarah. Not because she wasn't enjoying Chuck's pleasant conversation, and not because he wasn't a perfect gentleman, but because he was just so damn charming. So charming, in fact, that there had been a moment - a very brief one, as he told her the story of breaking his arm at age seven - when she had almost slipped, had almost told him about the time she had broken her wrist being hit by an armored truck.
She spent the rest of the ride to the restaurant in a more shy, more appropriate 'first date' manner. Keep it together. Keep it together, Sarah, said her conscience, which sounded heartbreakingly like her former partner.
Sarah was very grateful for the large margarita Chuck ordered for her once they had sat down, and even more grateful when she saw two straws in it, rather than one. She took a rather large gulp, savoring the feeling of it sliding down her constricted throat.
Chuck quirked an eyebrow at her, but said nothing as he dipped a chip in the bowl of salsa. Desperate to get him talking again, Sarah asked him to tell her about his family. The blonde spy inwardly sighed in relief as he began to ramble, creating a stream of easy conversation that carried away her shot nerves.
It was only halfway through her first bite of chicken fajita that she realized she was laughing so hard, she was in danger of choking.
"Easy, killer," said Chuck. "I'll be here all week."
His eyes crinkled pleasantly as he grinned at her gulping water in order to properly swallow the bite. Sarah was glad she was still trying to breathe after he said it, because the casual remark hit way too close to home.
Please don't let it come to that tonight, she told him silently as he focused on spreading guacamole on his own fajita. Sitting in the neon light of the beer signs on the walls of the restaurant, her cheeks pleasantly warm from tequila and smiling so often, Sarah found it very difficult to believe that it would. At least, it wouldn't take that turn because of the man sitting across the table from her.
Nice guys aren't sent government secrets, echoed Graham in her head.
Maybe not. She considered him, biting her lower lip thoughtfully. But just say they are…
She couldn't find a remote part of her being that would mind being stuck in Burbank if it meant laughing this hard - harder than she had in years - every day.
Sarah didn't notice anything out of the ordinary during dinner; Chuck's only nervousness seemed to be coming only from first-date jitters rather than something more sinister. She was beginning to think the whole operation was a wash when he suddenly stopped on the overpass they were strolling across, a peculiar, troubled look on his face.
"God, I'm not funny, I don't listen to music…this must be your worst date ever, right?" she asked, as he turned away from her and stared at the motorcade bearing under the bridge. When he didn't answer, red flags started going up in her mind. Sarah tipped her head to the side, trying to see his face. When she did, her hand flew to her gun out of confusion and habit.
Chuck looked completely unlike himself - at least, completely unlike the Chuck she had seen thus far. His eyes were unfocused, his head tipped back a little farther than would be considered normal, and she could tell he wasn't drawing breath.
"I was waiting for you to say no," she said, injecting a bit of hurt into her voice, hoping to play on his gentlemanly nature in order to get him to react. A second later, he had turned around, an indistinct but slightly shell-shocked expression on his face.
"Sorry - sorry," he said, distracted. He looked back at her, and instantly, he seemed to be back to normal. "I kinda zoned out there for a second. No! No no no, God no! I, uh…I've had -" he put a hand on her lower back, where her own had been tensed on her gun only a moment before. "I've had much worse, uh…much worse dates - experiences over all, with - with - with women."
And with that, Sarah could see no trace of his strange behavior left. As they continued walking, Sarah's mind was buzzing with this new development. Either he had seen someone he knew, something that troubled him, or he frequently zoned out like that. Sarah would have put money on the first, none on the last, and her life on the second.
It was with a renewed sense of wariness that Sarah followed him down the stairs of the venue.
Sarah knew she was completely trashing her cover as she recklessly pulled Chuck onto the dance floor. She dropped it in a muddy puddle as she pinned one agent to the far wall with a poisoned hair piece, dragged it through a couple more as she sped backwards through small Los Angeles streets, and lit it on fire as she explained the situation in the ten seconds it took the small Nerd Herder to shudder to a stop at the bottom of the alley.
"Listen to me, Chuck. Those men will hurt you. They're from the NSA, and they're after you," she told him.
"Me?" he squeaked. "Why - wait, wait, wait, why me? I'm nobody - I'm the supervisor of the Nerd Herd, at a Buy More! Maybe one day -"
Sarah tuned him out as she scanned their surroundings. The guy had a lot going for him, but she had never met anyone who talked so much.
Then she couldn't feel anything.
She would never understand, even many years later, how she was able to walk after the SUV had slammed into her. She gave herself enough time to flex her toes, and, after being surprised at finding them whole instead of crushed, ripped herself and Chuck free of their seat belts. She was grateful he wasn't going into shock (at least, not yet) as she crawled out of the car and pulled him out, as well.
"Get out of the car," she panted. "Let's go, Chuck - move!"
They were alive and running; she had him by the hand; they were going to make it -
Chuck's hand was ripped away from hers as he tripped over a disembodied metal piece of car. She stopped, intending to go back and get him, but the headlights trained on her were more of a distraction.
Sarah's mind seemed to go into hyper drive. She swayed on the spot, looking from the man lying on the ground a few feet away from her to the oncoming vehicle, and then made her decision.
This was spying at its very core: any person, whether mark or partner, was expendable as long as the mission was a success. Sarah had learned this rule well enough in the academy, and it had become second nature in the field. If it was a choice between the success of the mission or the life of your partner, you chose the mission. Your partner knew that. Assets didn't, but they were dead or locked up so quickly that it usually didn't matter.
The success of the mission. That was the only acceptable outcome.
Every single time.
The success of this mission did not depend on Chuck surviving. It depended on finding out what had happened to the Intersect, and Sarah knew she had sufficient information to help the CIA do just that.
"Sarah, look out!"
It was the last thing she expected. Chuck was on his hands and knees, horribly exposed, a breath away from dying, and he wasn't even looking at the car.
He was looking at her.
Her heart reached out in a way it never had before. She didn't realize it then, but it would stay that way for the next few years of her life.
Sarah threw the knife, destroyed the car, grabbed Chuck by the hand again, and was never the same.
After all the yelling, the gun-pointing, the running, and the bomb-diffusing was over, Sarah knew she was gone. She knew she would never willingly let Casey - or the NSA - or anyone - ever touch him. She knew that this man was the best person she had ever met.
She knew he would never make it in the spy world.
And so she defended him and his family. She stared Casey down, body coiled to attack when he mentioned breaking things and dropping Chuck in a psych tank.
She would never let it happen.
Sarah waited at the beach for hours, feet bare and heart still pounding. Chuck was sitting near the water, his arms looped around his knees, staring out at the horizon. Sarah only gathered the courage to walk up behind him when she realized that she would have to get him back to his apartment soon.
"How long you been here?"
Chuck didn't turn his head as she sat down next to him.
"All night," she replied, her voice a bit high with nerves.
"There's nowhere I can run, is there."
It was a statement rather than a question. Sarah wished she could give him a different answer.
"Not from us." Sarah wished this conversation were as easy as their dinner date. That conversation had been easy, natural. This conversation, on the other hand, was going to hurt.
It had to happen. For his protection.
"Talk to me, Chuck."
"Yesterday, I was making eleven bucks an hour, fixing computers. Now I have one in my brain, and…I can't figure out why Bryce did this, why he chose me."
Chuck glanced at her. "What are you gonna do with me? What happens now?"
Sarah steeled herself against the damage she was going to do. "For now, you go back to your own life. We'll protect you…and you'll work with us."
I'll protect you.
And in true Bartowski fashion, he asked the question no one else would think when faced with a mysterious government catastrophe that was threatening their whole world:
"And my sister, my friends - are they in danger?"
"Tell them nothing, to keep them safe." Sarah looked him very seriously in the eyes. She had a feeling that this may be the one thing that endangered him, the man who talked too much and cared too much.
"I need you to do one more thing for me," she added, lacing her fingers together, as if in prayer.
Chuck, defeated, turned his head toward her.
"Yeah?"
I know, it's one more thing added onto things you shouldn't have to do, she thought sadly.
"Trust me, Chuck."
He mustered up the smallest, most half-hearted smile she had ever seen. The fact that it was there, however, made her feel more protective than ever.
She met his gaze. Her nerve began to fail her as she realized his brown eyes were looking at her, into her, seeing her as no one ever had before. She broke their contact and looked bashfully down at the sand. Desperate to lighten his mood, she nudged him. When he didn't nudge back, she decided to try and look back up at him.
His eyes were as penetrating as ever, but the expression on his face was the best answer she was going to get for her request.
You may not know it now, she thought, sitting in companionable silence, looking out over the dawn, but I am going to be with you forever, Chuck Bartowski. Even if that means I hire a private agent to watch you and your family while I am away, just to make sure you're safe…
Sarah closed her eyes, soaking in the calm warmth of the sun and the man beside her.
Just to make sure you're always safe.