One Year Earlier

2:59 A.M., Pacific Daylight Time

March 8th, 2012

Studio City, California

Chuck had come somewhat awake when Sarah left the bed, and had stayed up, waiting for her return. When she didn't return after a few minutes, he grew a little concerned.

Then he heard voices down the hall. One was clearly Sarah. He couldn't make out what she was saying, but it didn't sound good.

And then he heard a voice that chilled him to the bone. It was General Beckman. "These two recognized me as being part of Fulcrum because they're little baby Intersects, aren't they?"

"Oh, God," Chuck whispered. He rolled across the bed to Sarah's side, praying she had her gun.

She didn't. The Colt M1911A1 was in the nightstand. Chuck grabbed it, and slowly crept out the door of the bedroom, down the hall toward the twins room.

"Imagine how much money I could make off of these two!" he heard Beckman continue. "How much do you think the Mossad would pay for a sixteen month old human Intersect? How about MI-6?"

"General, please, those are my CHILDREN," Sarah pleaded.

"You should have thought of that before destroying everything I worked for, Agent Walker," Beckman replied, with a fatal finality in her voice.

Chuck winced as he heard Beckman's gun go off. The bullet struck Sarah in the abdomen, and she staggered backward.

Chuck spun around, catching Sarah in his left arm as she fell, and bringing her Colt up in his right hand. As soon as it leveled with Beckman's chest, he pulled the trigger – once, twice, three times.

An enormous bloom of red appeared on Beckman's torso as she staggered backward. She slammed into the bulletproof window, looked down in disbelief – and then slumped to the floor, dead, leaving a streak of blood on the wall behind her.

John and Lisa were both bawling, but Chuck could barely hear them. He was too concerned for Sarah, as he laid her down on the floor.

"G-good shooting, b-babe," she whispered. She was bleeding heavily.

Chuck grabbed the receiving blanket off the changing table and folded it up. "Hold this against your stomach, HARD," he instructed her. "I know it might hurt, but you've gotta do it!"

Running back to the bedroom, he tossed the gun on the bed, and grabbed his iPhone. With hands shaking, he dialed John Casey's number. "Come on, pick up, pick up!" Chuck muttered as he went back out into the hallway where Sarah was.

"'llo?"

"Casey! It's Chuck. Sarah's been shot, and I have a dead former NSA director in my kids' bedroom."

"Shit," John Casey uttered. "Call 911. I'll be right there."

And the phone went dead. Chuck dialed again, and held the phone to his ear.

"911 Emergency Response, what is the nature of your emergency?"

"Uh, my wife's been shot… gunshot wound to the abdomen… she's a Caucasian female, twenty-nine years old, five foot nine, about a hundred thirty pounds…"

"Alright, sir, please remain calm. We have an ambulance on the way right now. What is your location?"

"4320 Saint Clair Avenue, in Studio City," Chuck said. Sarah's grip on his hand suddenly tightened, almost painfully so, and she whimpered in pain.

He looked down at her. Her face was white and contorted in pain, and blood was still seeping out from under the receiving blanket.

"Please hurry." Chuck pressed the end button on the iPhone.

He looked down at Sarah. "I'll be right back, babe," he said. "Keep holding that blanket on!"

"Okay," Sarah groaned, a sharp note of pain in her voice.

Chuck stood up and ran to his office. Throwing open the desk drawer, he grabbed a pair of scissors. He turned around and committed a cardinal sin, running with scissors, but he wasn't too concerned with that just at that moment.

He knelt back down next to Sarah. "I need you to pick the blanket up for just a second," he said.

"Hold the blanket, don't hold the blanket… make up your mind," Sarah whispered, trying to inject humor into a truly unfunny situation. But she did as she was told, and lifted the blanket up.

A fresh flow of blood greeted Chuck. "Goddammit," he muttered. He quickly used the scissors to cut Sarah's tank top up the front, and pulled it away from her chest.

The bullet wound astonished him. Whatever ammunition had been in General Beckman's gun had really done a number on Sarah's abdomen. "God almighty," he breathed. Grabbing Sarah's hand that held the blanket, he forcefully pressed it back down on the wound to stop the flow of blood again.

"Ow," she whimpered, a tear making its way down her cheek.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he said, trying to keep his voice from breaking.

There was the sound of a key in the front door, and it swung open. John Casey came storming in like doomsday personified.

He turned into the hallway, and saw Sarah lying on the floor with Chuck over her. Casey took in the amount of blood on Sarah, on Chuck's hands, on the floor. "Jesus," he croaked.

Casey crouched on the floor next to Sarah. "You doin' okay, Walker?"

"Does it look like I'm doing okay, Casey?" she whispered back.

Casey looked at Chuck, making eye contact. Casey's expression was grim. Then he looked past Chuck, into the twins' bedroom.

Louisa Beckman's corpse was slumped against the opposite wall. "Okay, we gotta get that out of here," Casey said. He pulled out his phone and dialed.

"This is John Casey," he said when the phone was picked up. "I need a cleanup team at 4320 Saint Clair Avenue in Studio City, post haste."

He hung up the phone, as the sound of sirens announced the arrival of a Los Angeles Fire Department paramedic unit. "Go get dressed, Bartowski," Casey told him as the paramedics came running into the house. "You're gonna need to be in that ambulance with her."

"But… the kids…"

"I'll make sure the kids get to Ellie and Devin's," Casey assured him. "Go get dressed."

Chuck got up and staggered back to his bedroom. In a daze, he pulled on an old Buy More polo and a pair of jeans, and jammed his Blue Sun ballcap on his head. He slipped on a pair of flip-flops, and quickly went back out to the hallway, collecting his wallet and his keys as he went.

By the time he got back to where Sarah was, the paramedics were gently lifting her onto a gurney. One of them had placed a pressure pad on Sarah's abdomen, allowing her to remove the receiving blanket. She had started to lose color in every part of her body, not just her face, and that alarmed the hell out of Chuck.

The paramedics began to wheel Sarah out of the house, to the ambulance in the driveway. Chuck started to follow.

"Bartowski!"

Chuck turned back to see Casey, holding his iPhone out to him. "You probably want this."

"Thanks," Chuck replied, grabbing the phone.

"Chuck… keep me updated, okay?"

"I will, John," Chuck said, and turned and ran out the front door.

The ambulance ride over the hills and into West Hollywood seemed like it took forever, though in reality it was maybe fifteen minutes from the house to Cedars-Sinai. Chuck wanted to know why exactly they were going there.

"It's the closest hospital with a major trauma center," he was told.

Casey had apparently contacted CIA doctor and Cedars-Sinai OB/GYN Ronald Zinn, because he met them at the emergency room, still shaking off sleep. "What the hell happened?" he asked, as Sarah was rushed inside.

"Did you hear about General Louisa Beckman?" Chuck asked.

"I heard that she resigned. What about her?"

"She was Fulcrum," Chuck replied.

Zinn's eyes widened. "Holy crap."

"Yeah, well, she dropped off the grid after resigning, and popped up about an hour ago in our twins' bedroom. She blamed Sarah for everything, and decided it would be fun to shoot her. I returned the favor."

"You mean, General Beckman's dead?" Dr. Zinn asked.

"Yeah. And Sarah…"

Chuck's mouth tightened, and Dr. Zinn could see that it was taking a great deal of effort for him to stay composed.

"Sarah will be fine," Ronald Zinn told Chuck. "Cedars has got the best trauma staff in California. They'll take good care of her."

Chuck wished he had the doctor's confidence. He took a seat in the waiting room, becoming an anonymous face in a gigantic room of anonymity.

About an hour after they arrived, John Casey came in. "Any word yet?" he asked, making a beeline for Chuck.

Chuck just shook his head. Casey sighed and collapsed into the seat next to him.

"Beckman's gone," he told Chuck. "The DIA cleanup team has the twins' bedroom all cleaned up, and they're going to have somebody out to do the carpet in the hallway tomorrow.

"I took Lisa and John over to Ellie and Devin's apartment," he continued. "I told them what had happened, and they freaked out a little bit. Ellie wanted to come over here, but I convinced them that it would be better if they stayed home with the kids."

Chuck nodded. "Thanks, John," he said quietly, and then fell quiet again.

Casey didn't say anything else, leaving the younger man to his thoughts.

Just before 6:00 AM, Chuck's phone lit up with a text message. It was from an anonymous number.

Chuck – heard about Sarah. Hang in there. BL

Chuck wanted to know exactly how Bryce had heard about Sarah, but he figured that Bryce was probably still one of the most well-connected people in the CIA, even if he was working deep cover.

About fifteen minutes after that, the phone rang. It came from a number Chuck didn't recognize, in the 435 area code. He pressed the "answer" button. "Hello?"

"Chuck. It's Carina."

The DEA agent's voice lacked the usual flirtatiousness and cheekiness that it usually held. "Hi," he replied.

"Listen, I heard about Sarah. If there's anything I can do, please let me know, and I mean that seriously, not in my usual 'I'm trying to seduce you' sort of way."

And for some reason, the fact that both Bryce and Carina had taken the time to contact Chuck about this was starting to choke him up. "Thank you," he said softly, trying to keep his emotions in check.

"You can reach me at this number, Chuck. Please, keep me updated."

Carina disconnected, and Chuck put the phone away. He leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

Seemingly just as soon as he had closed them, they snapped open. "Chuck," he heard somebody say his name.

He looked around, disoriented. Sunlight was streaming in through the windows, and CIA Director Sam Tyler stood in front of him – wearing a flight suit.

"Director Tyler?" he asked, confused.

"Good morning, Bartowski," Tyler said, handing him a cup of coffee. "I heard about Walker and shanghaied an F-15 out of Langley. Got me here in two hours."

"Not bad," Chuck muttered, sitting up and stretching his back.

"Any word yet?" Tyler asked, sitting on Chuck's right. To Chuck's left, John Casey was also stirring.

"Not yet," Chuck replied. "But…"

He saw Ronald Zinn crossing the waiting room toward him, with another doctor in scrubs behind him. Neither of the doctors looked particularly happy, but neither did they look grim, which gave Chuck hope.

"Good morning, Chuck," Dr. Zinn said. "Colonel Casey, Director Tyler."

"Dr. Zinn," Tyler said.

"This is Dr. Mark Wathen," Dr. Zinn told them. "He was the lead surgeon working on Sarah, and he's got some news to share with you."

Drs. Zinn and Wathen sat down facing Chuck, and Chuck returned to his seat. "The good news," Dr. Wathen began, "is that your wife is going to be alright."

Chuck blew his breath out in relief, and hung his head, looking at the floor. "But," Dr. Wathen continued, "there was a large amount of damage. The bullet used was designed to do as much damage as possible. It flattened out on its way through your wife's abdomen, doing some serious damage to her liver and her right kidney, as well as destroying her spleen. When it exited her back, it nicked her spinal cord. There won't be any lasting damage, but it did cause nerve shock that may create difficulty in walking for her for a while."

Wathen didn't sound or look like he was finished. "What else?" Chuck asked. "Just tell me everything."

"Your wife was approximately four weeks pregnant," Wathen said. "I doubt if she knew, just as I'm sure you didn't know. However, the bullet penetrated and caused irreparable damage to your wife's uterus. We had to abort the pregnancy and perform a hysterectomy."

Chuck's face drained of color, and he leaned back in his seat. "Oh, God," he said softly, pressing his hands against his face. "That's gonna kill her."

"Mr. Bartowski, I assure you, your wife will physically be fine –"

"No," Chuck interrupted Dr. Wathen. "I mean, she's not going to take that very well. She wanted so badly to have at least one more kid…"

He sighed. "When can I see her?"

"Not for a couple of hours, at least," Dr. Wathen replied.

"Alright," Chuck said. "Just, don't tell her about the pregnancy, the hysterectomy. She needs to hear that from me.

"Even then, it's gonna tear her apart."