Scene V –Buy More Plaza Parking Lot

Chuck found his stomach was turning slightly as he crossed the parking lot.

It wasn't unusual for Chuck's stomach to do flip-flops as he headed for the Weinerlicious. The food was unappetizing enough before Sarah turned her questionable cooking skills on it; the company was the only reason he ate there. Today, however, anticipation of the food wasn't causing the upset stomach. He was just plain nervous.

He stood in front of the door for a moment before he built up enough courage to head inside. After drying his hands on his pants, he pushed the door open. A bell cheerily announced his arrival.

Behind the counter stood Sarah, resplendent in her ridiculous red-and-white Weinerlicious uniform and pigtails. She smiled hospitably at the customer at the counter as she finished filling his order. Her smile became far more personal as she noticed Chuck.

He couldn't help but return that smile. The butterflies in his stomach redoubled their efforts.

When Sarah finished helping her customer, she called over her shoulder, "I'm taking lunch." She ducked under the counter and grabbed a tray of food she had prepared for the two of them.

An obviously disapproving Scooter looked like he wanted to say something, but thought better of it. Instead, he took over at the counter for the next customer. "Guten tag, un wilkommen a Weinerlicious," he said in a slightly nasal voice. The next customer started placing his order in an annoyed tone.

Sarah approached Chuck; the slightest hint of nervousness crossed her delicate features. He tried to give her a reassuring smile, but he was unsure how successful he was – he felt pretty nervous himself.

Sarah set the tray on a nearby table and turned to face him. Her eyes focused on him, she suddenly seemed to find her confidence. She placed her hands against the top of his chest as she gave him a slow, gentle kiss in greeting.

His eyes closed as he tipped his head to the side, losing himself in her. He placed his hands on her waist, as much to steady himself as to hold her. It seemed so unreal to have her here, kissing him, without a shred of doubt that the kiss was for real.

Only when the two separated did Chuck realize that Sarah had popped onto her toes; she dropped back down to the floor. "Hi," she said with an impish grin and twinkling eyes.

Despite his struggles to breathe, Chuck somehow found the air to speak. "You know, I could so get used to that."

"Well, you'd better," Sarah answered. "I plan to make that something of a habit." She playfully tugged his tie.

"I gotta say I like the sound of that."

Chuck basked in the glow of Sarah's smile, feeling like they were the only two people in the world. After a long but comfortable silence, Sarah turned to pick up the tray of food. "Grab some napkins?" she asked as she headed outside. Chuck obliged, stopping off at a kiosk to grab napkins and condiments before following Sarah outside to the deserted patio. He tried to hurry and catch up with her so he could pull out her chair.

"Chuck, don't," Sarah said a bit sharply as she set the tray on the table. Chuck froze; the way she spoke to him stung a little.

She looked at him with a casual and slightly cool expression; the affection was gone from her face. "Believe me, I appreciate the thought. I really do. However, we need to keep things hidden from Casey, so we'll need to fight our instincts at times." She sat down in the chair on the far side of the table. When he stood motionless for a moment, she motioned for him to sit.

A bit taken aback, Chuck was slow to sit down. Sarah offered him a more friendly expression as she pulled a wrapper off a hot dog. "I know this isn't going to be easy for you, Chuck. You wear your emotions on your sleeve, and that's one of the things that I like about you. However, we simply can't let Casey know what's going on, so we have to be careful to keep things under wraps." She took a deep breath before she continued. "We need to set up some rules."

Starting to understand that Sarah wasn't really unhappy with him, Chuck relaxed a bit. He unwrapped a hot dog of his own and started adding condiments. "Rules? Like what?"

"The first, and most important, is that neither of us takes it personally when one of us pushes the other away. I had to do that: when we sit out here, Casey can see us from the Buy More. Visual cues of any kind have to be minimized, so I had to push you away."

"OK, that sounds simple enough."

"It might sound simple, but doing that day after day gets tough. Take right now: I want nothing more than to hold your hand on the table, but I have to fight the urge. That would be a dead giveaway to Casey."

At that, Chuck felt a tangle of emotions: he was touched that she wanted to hold his hand and disappointed that he couldn't.

After swallowing a bite, she continued, "Take the way I spoke to you. I love that you wanted to pull out my chair for me, but again, as soon as Casey sees that, he's onto us. I'm sorry about that, by the way."

Chuck nodded acknowledgment to the apology. "Why couldn't that just be part of our cover?"

"I suppose you could argue that, but Casey gets suspicious in a hurry. It's just best not to push those limits. By keeping a tight rein on things, we keep him from having reason to get suspicious and watch us too closely."

Chuck was feeling a bit down about the whole thing. Things had changed, but he still was going to be forced to keep his feelings in check. His mind started looking for other solutions, hopeful that their relationship could remain somewhat normal. "So, what if we went somewhere else for lunch?"

She smiled. "We can do that … but not too often. That would be a change in our routine and would arouse suspicion."

"You sound so clinical about all of this."

"Force of habit, believe me."

Chuck wiped a bit of mustard from his mouth. "OK, so we need to be careful where Casey can see us."

"It's not just being careful; it's acting in a believable way. If you were suddenly cold to me in front of Casey all the time, he would try to find out why. Then we would need to come up with a reason that you were being cold to me. Plus, we would need to find a way to give him that reason without making it too easy for him to find out; otherwise, he would get suspicious about that."

"OK, my head's starting to spin."

She gave his a conciliatory look. "I understand." She frowned as she thought for a minute. "Look, being undercover is just about telling a believable story that you want to others to believe. If most of the pieces match and you don't give anyone reason to look too carefully at it, you're going to be fine."

"So we tell Casey the story that we're not dating."

"More specifically, that things are the way they were: we have feelings for each other that we're fighting. That way, if either one of us slips, we'll have a bit of leeway."

Chuck smiled knowingly. "You mean, if I slip."

"Oh, don't sell yourself short. I could just as easily slip, especially when you smile at me the way you do."

Of course, there was nothing for Chuck to do but smile at the compliment.

Sarah allowed herself to look at him for a moment, then dragged her eyes away and focused on pushing her French fries around. "You're really going to need to stop that, Chuck. At least, until we're somewhere that I can do something about it." She turned her face down towards her plate, but still managed to give him a shy smile as she looked up at him through her eyelashes.

Chuck, facing away from the Buy More, had no reason to keep his smile from growing even bigger.

Scene VI – Buy More

After lunch, Chuck floated back to the Buy More. He hadn't been quite sure what to expect on his first pseudo-date with Sarah; part of him was afraid that things would be nervous and awkward. Neither he nor Sarah qualified as an expert on relationships, and part of him feared that would be a big problem now that they were dating.

So far, that wasn't the case. Despite a discussion of the various "rules" that Sarah was insisting upon, the lunch had been fun. Conversation flowed smoothly, and there was enough flirting to set his heart racing a couple of times. Best of all, he made her giggle three different times. Although she was quick to hide her face each time in case Casey was watching, the sound alone was music to his ears.

Entering the store, Chuck was distracted by the echoes of Sarah's laughter, so when he stopped to tidy up some items on a store display, Morgan was able to sneak up behind him. In a sing-song voice, the bearded man quietly said, "They're getting clo-ser."

Chuck started, both from how close Morgan had gotten and the words of warning. He continued towards the Nerd Herd desk, Morgan at his side. "Wait, what? Who's getting closer?"

"They are, Chuck. And they are dangerous."

"Morgan, what are you talking about?"

As they arrived at the Nerd Herd desk, Morgan pointed across the store. Three coldly beautiful women wearing matching dark red polo shirts and form-fitting, knee-length khaki skirts were talking with one of the salespeople. The green-shirted young man looked like he desperately wished a hole in the earth would suddenly open up and swallow him.

"Maroon shirts," Chuck breathed. "I thought they were just a part of the Buy More mythology."

"I know, Chuck. Look at them," he said, shaking his head. "So aloof, so unattainable … three magnificent harpies sent to lure us to our deaths using their dulcet songs, beguiling charms, and tight buns."

"First of all, Morgan, sirens, not harpies, lure men to their death using their songs … and the only place you'll be lured is a Buy More sexual harassment seminar if you keep talking about their buns."

"Chuck, please … keep it clean. I was talking about their hair." All three ladies, one blonde, one brunette, and one redhead, had their hair tautly pulled back into neat little knobs on the backs of their heads. "Although now that you mention it..."

"Morgan…"

Morgan didn't notice. He continued to stare at them; he mused, "I wonder why they're here."

Chuck thought he knew. Maroon shirts were Buy More auditors. Despite the high sales totals generated by Lester's brain child, the Black Valentine's Day sale, Chuck suspected their presence didn't bode well for how the store was doing overall.

As if sensing the conversation about them, the three women looked over at the Nerd Herd desk. Deciding they were finished sinking their claws into the terrified green shirt, the brunette dismissed him with a backhanded flip of a hand. He gratefully scurried away.

The three maroon shirts crossed the store toward Chuck and Morgan with long, confident strides. Morgan's eyes slowly widened as his jaw slackened. "So beautiful … they're like three naughty librarians coming to punish us for an overdue book."

Chuck stared at his friend for a moment, utterly dumbfounded. He quickly refocused on the approaching auditors.

The three adopted confident stances, side-by-side, about five feet in front of the two men. The redhead eyed Morgan briefly up and down, and with a sniff said, "You. Green shirt. Vanish."

"Your wish, milady." Morgan scooted away after a flourish of a hand and a poor imitation of a bow. The redhead rolled her eyes.

The blonde woman checked Chuck's badge against her clipboard. "Mr. Bartowski," she said, her finger identifying his entry on the payroll sheet. "Glad to see a member of the Nerd Herd somewhere near his station."

"Ah ha!" Chuck laughed awkwardly. "Just finished my regulation thirty-minute lunch break, ma'am."

"Uh huh," the blonde said skeptically. "And where were the other Nerd Herders?"

Chuck walked around to the back of the desk and, with a bit of aplomb, yanked a clipboard out of its holster on the desk and produced it for the woman. Without looking at it, he started reciting the jobs. "Lester Patel had a Mac system install at 6405 Mockingbird Lane scheduled to begin at 10:30, after which he was proceeding to AlphaGraphics for a problem they are having with their software. Jeff Barnes spent the morning at a corporate client resolving a print driver issue, but that one is turning out to be a bit thorny, so he's spending a little extra time there. Meanwhile, Anna Wu should be reporting for duty, right about…" Chuck made a show of checking his watch.

"Hi, Chuck," Anna said as she joined him behind the desk. She sat down in her chair and got right to work.

"…well, right about now," Chuck finished with a friendly but slightly smug grin.

Deprived of an opportunity to go after Chuck again, the blonde adopted an irritated expression. The redhead decided to jump in on the act. "I'll need to see your work logs for the past six weeks and your employee expense reports for the past month."

Chuck opened a drawer at his feet, pulling out two manila file folders and a red one. "Here are eight weeks of work logs, and the red folder contains the past month's expense reports."

The brunette woman eyed the other two with a knowing grin. The other women smiled back at her; Chuck could feel the gotcha question coming.

The brunette said, "I'll need to see your K26R requisition sheet for yesterday's activities."

"Well, I can't give you that," Chuck said with a shrug.

She crossed her arms triumphantly. "And why not?"

"Well, it was submitted yesterday for expedited equipment restocking per the Buy More company policy, as Nerd Herd deliveries crested the 10,000 threshold. However…" He bent down and flipped through the folders in a different drawer. He snagged a white piece of paper and stood back up, handing the paper to the surprised brunette. Chuck continued, "…I can give you the photocopy of the form I put into the file system as a placeholder until the corporate office returns the yellow copy of the form, probably in three to five business days."

Hesitantly taking the photocopy, she stammered, "Well, that last part certainly isn't customer policy."

The other two women stared at her in disbelief; the brunette flushed when she realized just how incredibly weak her protest was. "OK, fine." As if the words pained her, she added, "Nice work, Mr. Bartowski."

Chuck just picked up his coffee mug and tipped it towards the woman in acknowledgment before taking a sip. He nearly spit out the coffee when the brunette's expression started shifting towards something akin to hunger as she assessed him.

Big Mike, noticing the disconcerted looks on the auditors' faces, came lumbering across the store, arms pumping and face angry. "Bartowski! What didn't you get done?!" Turning to the women, he said, "I apologize for my employee. Say the word and he's outta here. He's one of the worst…"

"He passed with flying colors, Mr. Turner," the redhead informed him.

"He's one of the best employees we have. A credit to the Buy More brand. Wish we had ten more just like him."

The three women started walking, surrounding and starting to circle Big Mike. He eyed them warily; a bit of fear came to his eyes.

The blonde said, "Unfortunately, Mr. Turner, he is the only person to pass our audit."

"Nobody else has even come close to passing," the redhead added.

Big Mike's eyes darted to each of the women in turn as they passed in front of him. "Well, we certainly have got a few bad apples here, but for the most part…"

The brunette laughed. "A few bad apples?!"

The redhead said, "We've only seen one decent employee in the entire store."

The blonde added, "And we are not looking at him right now."

The brunette said, "Besides, we know that apples, especially the bad ones, don't fall very far from the tree."

The ladies kept circling. Big Mike's fear grew. "Wait, what are you saying?"

"What are we saying?" the redhead parroted him mockingly.

"We are not happy," the blond said.

"Not happy at all," the brunette said.

"I'm thinking our report back to headquarters is not going to reflect well on you," the redhead said.

Big Mike blurted, "Wait a minute. You can't blame me for this."

"Why not?"

"You're the manager."

"Your employees are incompetent."

"Your records are a mess."

"Your costs are through the roof."

"Your sales are abysmal."

"It's not looking good, Mr. Turner."

"How can things have gotten this bad?"

"What is it that you do here?"

"Give me one good reason we should keep you."

"One good reason."

"One good reason."

For once in his life, Big Mike was utterly speechless. He just stared at the circling women as if he knew what was happening and simply saw no escape. His lower lip quivered and he was perspiring heavily; he actually looked as though he might start whimpering.

Chuck sighed. For some reason, he couldn't let maroon shirts have Big Mike. I'm probably going to regret this, he thought, but he did it anyway.

"Wait," he said reluctantly. Four heads turned in his direction. "Surely you aren't going to file a report without completing a comprehensive audit, as well as an EAE. Isn't that standard policy, per the January memo from headquarters?"

The brunette seemed even more turned on by Chuck's knowledge of the latest company missives. However, the other two women glared at Chuck. The blond said, "Do you really think the employees here can pass the EAE?"

Chuck didn't. Big Mike was more interested in tabloids than training manuals; all but a handful of the most motivated green shirts were woefully under trained. However, it was Big Mike's only hope.

He gave the only answer he could. "I know my guys are ready."

The brunette eyed him up and down. "I bet they are," she said coquettishly.

If Chuck had coffee in his mouth, he definitely would have spit it out that time.

Big Mike hastily added, "The green shirts are ready."

The three women turned their attention back to the manager. "They'd better be," the redhead said.

"Your job depends upon it," said the brunette to Big Mike. She shot Chuck a final seductive look as the three women turned around and walked toward the front of the store.

Chuck turned to face his boss, who was still staring after the three maroon shirts. Employees scattered as the women walked out the front of the store.

Chuck said, "Well, that might have been one of the most uncomfortable moments in my life. You?"

Big Mike was starting to calm down. He pulled out a handkerchief and mopped his forehead. "Definitely. Thanks. You bought us a little time. I owe you one."

"No problem."

"Just one question, Chuck."

"Yes?"

"What's an EAE?"

Chuck stared at his boss. If Big Mike didn't know what an Employee Assessment Exam was, there was no way the green shirts would ever pass it.

Scene VII – Casa Bartowski, Chuck's Room

"Cut me, Chuck!" Morgan begged, sitting on a low chair, his face contorted with pain as he tried to catch his breath.

"Morgan, you can't go back in there," Chuck said, kneeling to the side of his friend. "It's a bloodbath! Throw in the towel."

The bearded man brought his eyes level with Chuck's. "Chuck, you gotta cut me. I can take this guy!"

"I really don't think you can, but here goes." Chuck took a safety pin and sterilized it with a match. He grabbed a hold of Morgan's right hand and popped a blister on his friend's gaming thumb.

Morgan screamed as if he was being tortured.

"You wimp," Chuck said.

Morgan made a big show of flexing his hand and shaking off the pain. "Patch me, Chuck. I'm gonna show this guy how we do things Echo Park style."

Chuck wrapped adhesive tape over the wound; the two bumped fists. "Take it to him, brother." Morgan re-entered the Call of Duty arena to face the foe that had defeated him four straight times, three by shutout. Chuck sat back to watch the predictable carnage.

This result was no different: Morgan was skunked again in a matter of minutes. He threw the controller to the ground in disgust. "Who the hell is this guy, Chuck? Where did you find him?"

Chuck forced an innocent expression to his face and shrugged. "Just a guy I met randomly."

"Well, he's one hell of a player. If we ever form a clan, we need to recruit him." Morgan checked his watch. "Oh, guess the pizza should be ready. I'll run out and grab it."

As his friend left the room, Chuck assumed Morgan's seat and entered the arena under his own character name. "Cash on the table," Chuck shouted.

"Got it." A few moments later the front door slammed.

Chuck put down the controller and grabbed the keyboard. He typed, "Clear."

His opponent, "Bulletpr00f9h0st" with the "Bull" colored red, responded on screen a few seconds later. "Hey, man, how are things?"

"Good. The better question is how R U?"

"I can't thank you enough. This gig is the best. The things I get to do…"

Chuck smiled. It was good to hear that Cush was happy.

Jeremy Cushman was a computer genius Chuck had met on a previous mission. With the man's help, the team had tracked down and captured a Fulcrum cell. In the little time that the two worked together, they had become fast friends.

After the mission was over, Director Graham and General Beckman had been ready to kill him for knowing a single IP address, one Chuck had used to flash on the CIA core computer network. Chuck had convinced the CIA to take Cush on as a computer specialist to utilize his immense talents.

He was doubly happy to hear things were going well: Jeremy Cushman was a good guy who was in the wrong place at the wrong time. More importantly, if the DoD was ready to kill the guy for what he knew, Chuck had no chance of ever getting back to a normal life given what was inside his head.

"You clearly don't have any problem 'sneaking out'." Cush was in a CIA bunker somewhere; Chuck had worried Cush wouldn't be able to find a way to communicate through the security. He should have known better than to underestimate Cush.

"Please, the first thing they set me up to test was the firewalls. I made them a deal: if I can tunnel out, they can't say two words if I play online games. I've taught them a bit of a lesson in humility – much like your friend."

Chuck laughed. He typed, "Yeah, I've never seen anyone pwn Morgan quite that badly."

"So tell me, do you ever see that blond agent any more?"

Chuck's grin only grew, despite the fact he wouldn't be seeing Sarah again that night. Casey was watching Chuck like a hawk, so the two had decided to be careful at first. Even though it was frustrating, it was far less frustrating than working side by side with Sarah believing nothing would ever happen between them.

It also helped to imagine how the evening's activities would torment Casey. If the NSA agent was going to watch Chuck this closely, Chuck was going to make it as painful as possible for the agent by involving Morgan. Getting to hang with Cush, so to speak, was an added bonus.

After considering what he wanted to say for a moment, Chuck started typing, "As a matter of fact…" His fingers danced across the keyboard as he talked and talked about Sarah.

A couple minutes later, Cush's only response was "NFW!"

Chuck smiled. It felt good to be able to tell somebody the truth about Sarah and him. It almost made up for the fact that their situation kept them apart yet again.

Almost.

Scene VIII – Los Angeles, Small Airport

The Los Mellizos henchmen climbed down the stairs of a private Lear jet onto the tarmac. They were dressed to appear as a wealthy married couple on vacation, down to the luggage that the pilot pulled out of the plane for them.

The man wore a loose-fitting flowered shirt that hung over his losee-fitting beige pants. A white hat crowned his head. The woman wore a black shirt and a flowing pair of white pants. The two chatted amiably as the pilot transported their luggage to an idling black sedan with tinted windows.

When the transfer was complete, the man tipped the pilot with a wad of bills and a smile of thanks. The two climbed into the back of the sedan, A third person, a man in his late-twenties with close-cropped blond hair wearing a nicely tailored dark suit, was sitting on the opposite side of the roomy back seat. The divider separating the front and back seats was up, providing the three with absolute privacy.

As the car drove to the airport exit, the blond-haired man handed both of the henchmen manila envelopes filled with a sheaf of papers and a series of pictures. He began speaking without preamble.

"The packets I've given you contain all the information we have on Sarah Walker, John Casey and Chuck Bartowski. We were unable to find local addresses on any of them."

"Then how are we supposed to be able to find them?" the woman growled.

The blond-haired man smiled professionally. "The first page in your packet explains all of that. Be at the specified address no later than noon tomorrow. You will be able to assume surveillance at that point."

He pounded the divider, and the driver pulled the car over to the side of the road. As he started to climb out, the other henchman reached across and grabbed the blond-haired man's arm. He eyed the henchman with a deceptively cool stare.

The henchman said, "Just make sure that when the time comes, your men stay out of the way. Sarah Walker is ours."

The blond-haired man nodded. The henchman released his grip, and the man climbed out of the car, shutting the door behind him.

As he watched the sedan drove away, the man shook his head. He didn't know exactly what Agent Walker did to those two, but he did not envy her if she fell into the hands of the Los Mellizos henchmen.