I've always thought that the most underused villian in Chuck was Ted Roark, think about it, he's a multi-billionare in charge of Fulcrum so he was also high up in the Ring, with technology made by Orion, and most importantly was unsuspected. He was like Volkoff except secret. He had the same type of obsession with a Bartowski as Volkoff did and also probably shook hands with the president. So I wanted to introduce him early, I also tried to portray Chuck as a little more in control then he is in the show, he is after all a successfull buisnessman. I also have always thought it was sad that Casey never got a date, every other character on the show has been in a relationship on screen except Casey, so I may have to change that, not sure.
Chuck sat on a bench at the train station waiting for the target to pass by. When the train came, Chuck flashed on one of the men and signaled to Casey who it was. Casey nodded and moved towards the man As Chuck stood by in stunned silence he watched as Sarah fired round after round at the assassins until he saw her go down in a hail of gunfire. As Chuck started to scream, the original target came up to him, put the gun to his face and pulled the trigger.
He awoke sweating and breathing heavily from the nightmare. The thought of Sarah dying while he sat there hopeless was unimaginable for him. After a quick shower he went downstairs for breakfast.
Ellie was the oven cooking eggs, "Hey Chuck, isn't today the day that Sarah takes over for Hannah as your secretary."
"Yeah it's basically happened already. Hannah is really excited about becoming manager. So, basically when I'm not around she is in charge of running the company."
Ellie laughed, "Isn't that what she already did?"
"Yes, but now its official."
Ellie came over and gave him a plate of eggs, she sat down at the table with him. "How do you think Sarah will do? Do you think she will be able to manage everything that comes across your desk?"
Chuck thought about it for a second, "Personally...I think she'll be glad to not have to deal with horny model directors asking for private interviews all day."
Ellie frowned, she was trying to ask a legitimate question, and here was Chuck goofing off, "Seriously Chuck, do you think she can do it? It is a really important job, being the secretary for someone in charge of a multi-million dollar company got to be pretty hard."
Chuck smiled, "Somehow I don't think it will be a problem."
When Chuck and Casey got to the parking lot, Chuck sees Sarah waiting for him at his parking spot. After a quick hug they walk towards the building with Casey as always, lurking behind them. Sarah has is in her usual work appeal, a fairly simple women's business suit, yet like everything else she put on, she looked like a supermodel in it.
"So Sarah, you think you'll be able to be a good secretary?"
"I've been a secretary more times than I want to remember, last time I was the personal secretary for a African dictator."
Chuck was genuinely intrigued, he gave a grin and asked in a mischievous voice "What did that involve?"
Sarah rolled her eyes, "Chuck this isn't really the kind of thing I usually talk about, the missions are classified."
Chuck laughs are waves his hands at Sarah, "Sarah, hello, I'm about as classified as someone can be."
Sarah smiles at Chuck and gives in, what he said was true, none of her missions were anywhere near as classified as Chuck was, "Well Chuck they mainly involved passing on directives to move money to overseas accounts and passing on assassination orders, Then using my lipstick camera to send all the data to the CIA."
"Don't think that's an issue here. Although there may be an angry businessman or two, people are still pissed that the whole deal with Marcus fell through. It was supposed to give us enough capital to make a military grade chip."
"Then I'll be polite." Both of them started laughing as they entered his office. The second they got in, the phone started ringing and Sarah sighed, "You weren't kidding." As she got on the phone.
Chuck moved to his office where he turned on his computer and started to try and do damage control on the whole Marcus situation. The company went ahead with the budget, taking into effect the money the deal would have provided, since it had been a sure thing that had taken nine months to develop. And of course this computer thing in his head had ruined that and quite possible jeopardized the whole company.
So now instead of celebrating a giant payday or even a toast for stopping a mercenary group, Chuck was struggling through spreadsheets and trying to save, the company he had built, from bankruptcy.
In the middle of this the computer monitor came up and General Beckman appeared, "Hello, Chuck. How are things."
"Not so good general, the loss of the money that Marcus would have given my company has really hurt our books; anyway you can help with that?" Chuck asked hopefully.
"I'll have our accountants look at it" said Beckman impatiently, "Our interrogators have finished with Marcus and found that he was scheduled to meet with the notorious Arms Dealer, La Ciudad, at an Art Auction at the Grand Ambassador, downtown."
"Oh I got an invitation for that thing. I was planning on going to try and figure out this whole money mess."
"We want you to go but for another reason. We need to see if you can discover who La Ciudad is."
"Couldn't you just get a description from Marcus, he was going to meet with the guy."
"Unfortunately Marcus had never seen La Ciudad himself, he is a very cautious man, nobody who has seen him has ever lived to tell about it." Chuck gulped, and once again wondered what he had been dragged into.
"Why do you need me, this seems like a mission for seasoned agents. I don't understand what I could possibly do."
"Our intelligence seems to believe that La Ciudad has heard of Marcus's capture and will be highly cautious, therefore we want someone who is a known factor in the social scene and will not raise his suspicion, you."
"General, I have real business that I have to do at this auction, is their anyway some other agent can do this."
"I'm sorry but you and Agent Walker are the only two who have the necessary background to complete the mission."
Chuck anger was apparent. Sarah realized that something was wrong and made her way into his office to see what was wrong, she came up to him with a concerned look on her face. Putting her arm on his shoulder she asked, "Chuck, what's wrong."
"It's this stupid mission, if we didn't have to do this, then I could meet with a couple of investors. Keep the company running. By the looks of things, if we don't get around 50 million dollars, I may be forced to shut down the company or worse, declare bankruptcy.
Sarah was genuinely concerned, but realized that she had to try and portray the idea that the mission was more important than anything so she gave herself a hard edge on her face, "Chuck I truly am sorry, but the mission comes first. If it's any conciliation, if we find this guy we could be saving thousands of lives."
"But ruining hundreds of people's lives," Chuck suddenly lost it and threw one of the clipboards against the wall as hard as he could. Sarah didn't say anything as Chuck tried to gather himself up, not sure she would be able to keep herself composed and worried she would show her true feelings. As Sarah looked on concerned Chuck tried to calm down. "Sorry about that I'm just really pissed right now."
Sarah leaned over and gave him a hug, "Don't worry Chuck, you'll figure this out, you won't let one screw-up ruin the whole thing you have built. I know you can solve this." As she looked at Chuck she saw him looking straight into her eyes and her heart dropped as she felt herself longing for Chuck. Chuck started to lean in and for the first time in her life Sarah was paralyzed, unable to think of anything, let alone do anything.
Just then the phone rang and the moment ended, "I got to take that," Sarah said blushing brightly and gave one final look at Chuck before running over to answer the phone
Chuck thought about what she said and shook it off. Yeah right he thought she makes it seem simple. All he needed to do was find a way to get 50 million dollars while trying to capture one of the world's most dangerous arms dealers who had never let anyone who had seen him live. Chuck rolled his eyes, hoping he never needed to find out what she considered hard.
Later that day Hannah stopped by to talk, "Chuck, a lot of the guys are really worried about the money situation, we were supposed to have a surplus of around 25 million and now were down 50."
Chuck put his hands up in disgust, "It's not my fault that the guy who we were dealing with turned out to be a terrorist."
"I know that Chuck and so does everyone else, but we are still hurting, and a lot of them are worried you will have to fire some of us," Chuck started to pace around the room and Hannah realized that Chuck had already been thinking of this problem for a long time.
"I know Hannah, but I'm going to the Art Auction tonight and am supposed to meet some potential clients there."
Hannah sighed very relieved. "Ok, I guess you are doing your best, I'll go and tell everyone."
As she started to walk out, Casey came in, preparing to go to the Auction. Hannah stopped in her tracks, "Hey Casey how're you doing?"
"Fine" grunted Casey
"What are you doing tonight, anything exciting?"
"I have to go to the Art Show with Chuck."
"Well that sounds fun." Casey grunted, "Well I got to go see you later Casey" said Hannah and as she walked out the door, she paused at the doorway to see if Casey would give any sort of reaction to her, when he didn't she sighed and walked out of the room.
Casey looks back at where Sarah and Chuck are visibly biting their lips to stop from cracking up. "Shut up you two, and let's go." Casey growls at them.
"Hey Casey I got a serious question for you." Chuck said running up to Casey.
"What?"
"Is there anything that I need to know, this is my first real mission and I'm worried."
Casey stopped and looked at Chuck, "Relax and focus on the mission, I heard about the money situation, put that out of your head and don't get distracted. You should be fine though, provided you can tango."
"Tango?" Casey stares at him grimly and walks away. Chuck shrugs though, Jill had taught him to tango so he wasn't that concerned with it, he wasn't good but he definitely didn't suck.
When the Chuck got to the limo that was taking them to the show, Chucks jaw dropped to the floor, not because of the limo but because of Sarah, who happened to be wearing a beautiful red gown with one shoulder bare, Chuck really didn't know much about fashion but did realize that the dress was probably extremely expensive and looked amazing on her.
"You look amazing Sarah"
"Thanks you look pretty good too." Chuck was wearing his best tuxedo, one that Jill had given him for his birthday last year, a custom made Brioni that cost around 8 thousand dollars.
Casey rolled his eyes, "Right now that we got that out of the way can we go, we don't want to be late."
When they got to the entrance, Chuck was nervous, sure he had gone to these events many times but all those times he had Jill on his arm, not Sarah, and while that may not seem that big of a difference, substituting one beautiful women for another, for Chuck it was huge. Jill had been the half that was good at these events, she would take control of room and knew exactly how to play it for their benefit, with Sarah it wouldn't be the same. He still didn't know how he was supposed to react to this situation with Sarah, he still loved Jill and believed he would forever, yet he looked at Sarah and…
"Ok we're there you ready Chuck?" Sarah looked at him pointedly. He looked outside and saw the cameras waiting for the celebrities to come in and sighed, this had really been Jill's specialty.
"As ready as I'll ever be." They stepped outside and into the snapping of cameras as the reporters all took their pictures, arm in arm they walked inside.
"Remember Chuck look out for La Ciudad, he's our first priority."
"Got it." Sarah was really surprised by the sudden change in Chucks demeanor when he got into the room, he immediately went up to many of the men in the room and greet them by name, almost all of whom knew him and were ecstatic to see he was getting over Jill.
By the time they got to the bar, Sarah shaken hands with two senators, a governor, several millionaires and a couple diplomats in a very short time.
When they got a seat, Chuck was immediately grabbed again, "Chuck Bartowski," he looked around and saw a man he didn't know sitting at the next stool.
"Am sorry I don't know if I know you."
"I'm Allen Waterman, from Stanford, how you doing."
Chuck remembered now, he was a member of the same frat in Stanford, he was one of those old money types who got in due more to his family money than his intelligence, "Pretty good, how about you?"
"Well I sold my part of my software company, am too rich to work, too young to retire, how about you, last time I heard you were fixing computers at a Buy More." Sarah leaned forward, interested in how Chuck was going to answer this.
Chuck waved his hand dismissively, "That was a long time ago, I founded Bartowski Incorporated and that's doing fine."
"No kidding, I heard of you" he leaned in, "Hey listen, if you need money or to slip a little out, I may have something that interest you" He hands Chuck his card who immediately flashes on it.
"Caiman islands, security fraud" Chuck mutters to himself. Alarmed Allen pick up his card and makes a hasty getaway. Sarah sitting next to Chuck and for the whole sequence had to try very hard to stop from cracking up.
Chuck goes back to scanning the room looking for La Ciudad when his eyes stop on a painting. Sarah sees this and looks up, "What's up, did you flash?" Chuck shakes his head.
"I'm not looking at the painting Sarah, am looking at the guy who is looking at the painting, he was the biggest of the possible investors for the company."
"Who is he?"
"A guy from Roark Industries, they are interested in some of the technology."
Sarah looked around, "Fine, we'll go over and talk to him, just make sure that you keep an eye out for La Ciudad."
As the two of them went up, the man from Roark saw them and waved to them. "Hey Chuck, nice to see you, and you are" he said looking at Sarah
"Sarah, Chuck's girlfriend," she says extending her hand.
"Nice to meet you Sarah I'm Drew, personal assistant for Mr. Roark, shall we talk."
"Shure," Chuck was starting to feel better now, not only did he now have a legitimate chance to keep the company alive, he hadn't flashed on La Ciudad. Just then Drew moved from where he was standing and the full painting was visible. The picture itself was really ugly, but Chuck felt a familiar tingling in his head and he flashed. It turned out that the painting was just a cover for its frame, in which nestled a container of VX nerve gas, one of the most dangerous substances in the world.
"You ok their Chuck, you spaced out for a second there." Drew looked at him concerned.
"Oh it was nothing, just a migraine, I'll get a drink and it will clear up." Chuck led Sarah to the bar.
"Chuck what is it." Sarah looked on concerned, she knew he had flashed but she had never seen him act like this after one.
"Where's Casey" asked Chuck looking around.
"He's outside, bodyguards aren't allowed inside so he is locking the perimeter down why, what did you see."
"We need him in here."
Sarah was growing frustrated and worried, "Chuck what did you see."
"The picture is worthless, what is worth something is the canister of VX nerve gas that is hidden in the frame."
Sarah was speechless, "Are you sure, are you 100% positive Chuck."
"You think I would be making this up," Chuck looked around to make sure nobody was watching, "I am sure, we have to get the marines in here."
Sarah shook her head, too much publicity, "No we got to get that picture, when does the bidding start for it?"
Chuck looked at his watch, "5 minutes"
"Chuck you must buy that picture, ok."
Chuck thought for a second before realizing he had no choice, if he did his company may go bankrupt but if he didn't, hundreds of thousands may die. "Ok I'll do it."
As they made their way to the auction site they saw Drew, who came over to say hi to them, "What are you two doing here?"
"Oh you see that painting," Drew nodded, "Were going to buy that."
Drew looked visibly disturbed, "I see, please excuse me for a second."
The two of them ignored him as they saw the other people who looked like they were going to bid against them. There was an older man who looked like a small time collector who Chuck dismissed immediately, as he did with the two sitting next to him. There looked to be only three serious bidders, a Middle Eastern man, a beautiful Latino and an elder gentleman. The second Chuck looked at him he flashed, seeing pictures of bodies and the word La Ciudad, "Sarah that old guy, he's La Ciudad." She nodded and started talking on her wristwatch.
By this time the auctioneer had finished his introduction and announced the starting bid of 50 thousand, the old guy immediately raised his placard.
"75" Chuck raised his
"100" the Arabic went up
"125" the Latino put hers up
This continued until at 400 thousand the Arab man stopped raising his placard and bowed out.
At 750 thousand the Latino bowed out and it was between Chuck and La Ciudad.
"One million" Everyone in the floor gasped as the old man said that, this painting, which was supposed to go for around 100 thousand was now the most expensive item being auctioned by far.
Chuck smiled for a second and then raised the stakes to a whole new level, "1.5 million" at that the room went silent, everyone awestruck by the amazing auction. As for La Ciudad, the man gave a glare at Chuck that probably could have melted Antarctica but Chuck stayed firm. In his eyes he was not seeing the man but the thousands of people he was saving.
"2 million, anyone 2 million, going once going twice, sold for 1.5 million" When the auctioneer said this the room exploded in applause. Everyone seemed to forget that the painting was worth a lot less than that. They were all just ecstatic over seeing such a good auction and Chuck was overcome by people coming over to shake his hand.
Suddenly La Ciudad came over, "Congratulations for your remarkable auction, what is your name?"
Just as Chuck was about to make up some name Drew came over, "Hey Chuck I talked to Roark and he scheduled a meeting between the two of you for tomorrow, alone if possible."
As Chuck was about to respond to Drew request, Sarah sees La Ciudad moving away talking on the phone. She hurries to Chuck, "Hey sweetie, I got to go to the bathroom, be right back." Before Chuck could say anything she was gone. And before he could do anything to get her back he was mauled by a fresh group of admirers.
Sarah was following La Ciudad and coordinating with Casey on the outside. The target had picked up two bodyguards but Sarah was still positive she could take him. She followed him to the garage where the second the door closed the three men pulled out guns and started to scream for her to surrender.
Cursing at herself for falling so neatly into their trap, Sarah dove to the nearest car and pulled out her gun. This was followed by Casey leading a group of agents in from the two exit ramps and surrounding La Ciudad and his agents. "Were MI-6" the three of them yelled.
Sarah stopped and a feeling of dread starting to fill her, "Wait you're not La Ciudad?"
"We thought you were."
"Me, why me?"
"Because the only fact we know about La Ciudad is that he is actually a she." At this Sarah felt like she had just gotten punched in the stomach. She started to run back into the building, knowing Chuck was in mortal danger.
"Casey the Latino, it's got to be her, she was just going betting low and waiting to kill whoever got the picture."
Wait Sarah, you'll blow your cover," Casey tried to convince her but she was already out of hearing range, rushing into the building.
Chuck had finally escaped from all of the well-wishers and was sitting at the bar waiting for Sarah to come back when the Latino women who had bid against him came up, and leaned over to him, showing him everything she had, "Well congratulations, senor?"
"Chu, Charles" he said as smooth as he could.
"Congratulations, Charles, it's rare for someone to beat me, let alone two people. But you know what, out of the two of you, am happy you won, you know why that is?" She said in a very seductive voice.
"N-No, why is that", Chuck managed to stammer, while attempting to close his legs.
"You are cute," The Latino whispered, running her hand through his hair and scooted even closer to him.
Chuck tried to pull away, "I h-have a girlfriend, you know" Chuck tried to make himself sound confident but when a beautiful women is literally thrusting herself on you, it's hard for anyone to sound secure.
The Latino made a motion of looking around the room, "Well I don't see her anywhere"
"She went to the bathroom"
"You know what they say, you snooze you lose," As she tried to push even closer to Chuck.
He tried to push her away, "I don't even know your name," he said desperately looking around for Sarah.
"It's Vivian, now can we go" She asked, grabbing Chucks hand and trying to move him to the elevator.
"W-Wait a second, why me?" Chuck said desperately trying to stall for time.
"Charles, you are cute, and," she moved till she was less than half an inch away from his face and whispered in a very throaty voice, "I like to meet men who will spend 1.5 million on a painting we both know was worth less than 150 thousand, they usually tend to spend a lot of money on entertainment." She gave his ass a little squeeze, "You coming" She asked as she walked as seductively as possible towards the elevator.
Chuck had about given up trying to resist temptation by now and started to walk to the elevator when he saw her hair move. She had an ugly scar on her neck and the Intersect flashed on it. It seems that lovely Miss Vivian was actually the notorious La Ciudad.
When he realized this, Chuck stated to move in the opposite direction, at least until La Ciudad motioned to a man in the croud who put a gun into Chucks back and guided him to the elevator. Where the elevator door closed, Vivian pulled out a knife, "Now Mr. Bartowski, we will discover how you figured the gas was in painting."
Chuck tried to maintain his cool, "Gas, what gas, I just liked the painting."
Vivian laughed, "Please Charles, I'm not stupid, I know you know that the gas was in there. Now I want two things from you, first," she said as she moved the knife around Chucks face, "How you knew were the gas was, and second, your signature on a piece of paper giving the painting to me. Oh and just remember Chuck, if you don't give me what I want, it won't turn out that good for you." She now put the knife on Chucks throat and gave the tiniest prick, just enough to draw blood and making Chuck shudder.
"I'm really sorry but I have no idea what you're talking about, please I'm just a businessman, let me go."
"Yeah a simple businessman who had a meeting with Marcus right before he disappeared," She sighed, "well Chuck I tried it the nice way. It's a pity really, if you had agreed to come to my room five minutes ago, it could have been enjoyable for both of us, now, I think it'll be enjoyable for me, but I sincerely doubt you will enjoy it that much." And with that, the door shut and Chuck was trapped.
Sarah raced to the main auction room to try and find either Chuck or the Latino women but the only person she saw was Drew. "Drew"
"Hey Sarah, congratulations on getting the painting"
"Have you seen Chuck?"
"I'm not sure I really want to get in the middle of this." Drew said hesitantly.
"God Damn it Drew, tell me." Sarah screamed
"Ok, ok, I saw him go on the elevator with the lady from the auction, I'm sorry I had to tell you." But by the time he finished Sarah was already running up the stairs.
When she went up a floor and got the handheld tracking beacon out, locating Chucks signal on the 4th floor.
"Casey where are you," she asked urgently.
"Right behind you," Sarah spun around and saw Casey standing there, he chuckled, "Wow, you really did let your guard down."
Sarah glared at him angrily, "Shut up. Let's get Chuck." The two of them headed to the room, when they got there they took positions around the door.
As Sarah moved to kick the door in Casey grabbed her, "Wait for backup."
The second he said that they both heard yelling from the room and then a crash, Sarah shook her head, "We can't risk it." Casey shrugged and kicked in the door. Even with the deadbolt lock, the door splintered from the force and Sarah ran into the room with gun in hand.
With the surprise entrance, Sarah managed to get a shot off and hit one of the two guards before he could react. Casey barged in and got the other, and both of them trained their weapon on Vivian.
"Well La Ciudad, we meet at last, surrender and I won't kill you," after thinking about it Casey changed his mind, "Well probably won't kill you."
"Whoever you guys are you probably think you've won right?" La Ciudad asked, Casey and Sarah nodded, "Well think again." Before either of them could stop her she jumped out of the window. As they watched stunned, she hit pool and swam to the other side before hopping in a car and driving away. Casey and Sarah stared at each other both a little shocked and a little impressed by what they had just seen.
"Can one of you help me, please" Yelled Chuck who was still tied to the chair and laying on the ground.
Later as they finished their briefing with Beckman and Graham, Beckman spoke up, "excellent job agents, the fact that you were able to secure the gas and identify La Ciudad is very impressive."
"General, she knows who I am; do you think she will come after me?" Chuck asked, very concerned with the idea.
"I don't think so; her goal is probably to get out of the country right now." Just then Chuck's phone rang and everyone stared at him.
"Sorry but I got to take this," looking down and seeing that it was Hannah, "Hey Hannah, what's up."
"You bastard, what did you do, buy a painting for 1.5 million, do you want us all to lose our jobs?' Hannah screamed at his the angriest he had ever heard her.
"Wait Hannah let me explain please," Chuck said desperately.
"No Chuck, and to top it off, I heard that you completely ignored two of the investors, was the deal Roark gave you so good you didn't need it." Hannah asked staring daggers at him.
"No but I'm meeting him tomorrow", Cuck tried to defend himsef
"That's something at least but not much, if you don't fix this I bet half of the workers will quit, ok." Before he could answer she slammed the phone down.
Sarah noticed something was wrong, "Who was that Chuck is something wrong?"
"It's Hannah she is really pissed since I didn't get the money the company needed and spent 1.5 million on a painting; she says the company may self-destruct if this money doesn't come through."
Sarah stared at him speechless, not knowing anything she could say that would make that situation better.
Graham cleared his throat, "Excuse me Chuck, I couldn't help but hear what you said, and I do believe this could now be considered a national emergency if your company fails, do you agree General"
"Yes" Beckman stared at Graham, they had obviously talked about this before and she didn't agree with whatever the option was.
"Therefore I believe that it would be the best interest of the country if the United States government would place a couple very large orders your computer chips, and most importantly announce them publicly." Graham smiled," I do believe that that would solve your money problem for a while."
Chuck stared at him, not knowing what to say, the fact that the government would buy his chips was one thing, but if they made a public announcement, the publicity would be astronomical and the companies' stocks would go through the roof. "Thank you sir," He really had no idea what to say.
Graham smiled, "Your welcome, dismissed."
The first thing Chuck did was get Hannah on the phone; she came on still pissed, "What Chuck."
"Our money problem is solved, I just worked out a deal with the government, the exact numbers aren't their yet but they have agreed to have a press announcement to acknowledge the deal."
Chuck had to put the phone away from his ear as he heard Hannah scream, "OK that's great, I've got to call some of the guys to stop this walkout ok bye."
The second call went to Roark Industries. "Hey Drew, I just wanted to let Ted know that we aren't as desperate for the money anymore."
"Oh hold on a second, Ted wanted to talk to you."
Chuck waited as Ted Roark came on the phone, "Hey Chuck, I heard you got some cash,"
"Yeah but you can't tell this to anyone, I consider you a friend so I'm giving you a heads up but don't tell anyone else."
"You have my word."
"The government just made a major deal for my computer chips and is planning on announcing it with a press conference.
Ted Roark was impressed, "Wow congratulations, now I'm really interested in investing."
Chuck laughed, "I figured you would say that, do you want to still meet tomorrow?"
"No I want to get this done tonight, if you can also put in your announcement a major deal with Roark Industries, it would probably become first page news."
"That's true, so what do you have in mind?"
"You were going to make a deal with Marcus that was he gets 10% of the company for around 75 million right?"
"We were but it feel through."
"Ok, I'm going to add 50 million on him, 125 million for 10 percent, but I want an actual say in the company, I want to be able to help choose the direction the company goes, that a deal for you?"
For the second time in five minutes, Chuck was speechless, the deal with Marcus had taken almost a year to complete and here was Ted Roark who nearly doubled the amount in five minutes, "Ted, that's beyond generous, I don't know what to say."
"Say yes, I've know you know for four years and consider you a friend. Plus, there haven't been that many good opportunities lately and your company has a great one."
"Well if you say so, I guess I have no option but to say yes."
"Excellent, our lawyers will make the final details, but I think lunch to celebrate is now in order, wouldn't you agree?"
"Yes"
"Then it's settled, tomorrow, where we planned to meet before"
"Sounds good," Said Chuck turning off the phone with a huge smile on his face.
Sarah had been watching Chuck on the phone and was still amazed by the different personas he portrayed. One minute he was a normal nerd the next second he was on the phone making multi-million dollar deals, and for the life of her she didn't know which one she liked more, they both were attractive in their own way.
All of the sudden, she realized that all her training was rebelling against her thoughts. Chuck was an asset, and her job was to protect him from all dangers, even herself. With that in mind she tried to stop herself from thinking about him, but once again failed miserably.
She looked at him and when she felt her stomach start to rise she horridly said, "I'm going home for the night, I'll see you tomorrow." Not waiting for a response she ran to her car and drove straight to her apartment.
The first thing she did when she got to her apartment was strip off all her cloths and take a long cold shower, trying to get back to some semblance of self-control. When she got out, she went to her bed and lay there for over an hour, trying to get Chuck out of her head. When all of her attempts failed she finally fell asleep, surrendering herself to a world where she could be with Chuck to her hearts content without any training manuels or operational conduct to think of.
The next morning, Chuck was feeling great, the upcoming government deal and the deal with Roark would now give them more capital than he had ever imagined at this stage of his career.
When he got to the office he ordered a companywide meeting where he told everyone what had just happened. The screams that were unleashed by this announcement probably could be detected on the Richter scale. After having his hand crushed by everyone Chuck finally escaped and got to where Sarah was standing.
"How did it go?" he asked
"I think that you'll get some pretty good Christmas gifts, that's for sure."
"Well I got to go to the meeting with Roark, you coming?"
"No, I think the phones will be pretty busy the next couple hours."
Chuck looked at her shocked, "The government is announcing the deal already, that's the fastest I've ever heard of them doing anything."
Sarah laughed, "Well when you have the Directors of the NSA, CIA, three senators and a governor advocating the deal, it usually get through fast."
"Where did you get the governor and senators?"
"They were the ones with smiley faces by their names in your contact book." Chuck smiled, realizing that Sarah probably could run the whole company.
"Ok, I'm still a little worried about La Ciudad though."
"Chuck she is long gone, don't worry about it." Suddenly a huge scream was heard in the hallway and every phone in the office started ringing. Sarah looked at Chuck, "Guess the announcement went through, I got to work now see you later."
By the time that Chuck got to the restaurant, he had gotten messages from everyone from the New York Times to that guy who did the Mad Money show for interview and messages of congratulations from some major players in politics and business.
As he got to the table he saw that Ted was already there, and he got up and shook Chuck's hand.
When they were sitting down Lou came out to greet them, "Hey Chuck, I heard about the deal congratulations, meals on me."
Ted looked impressed, "Wow, you do have connections, I've never seen anything in the government go through in a day, you must have a lot of strings to pull."
Chuck tried to stay modest, "I called in a couple favors."
"I'll say," Ted starting laughing, "The press announcement nearly went out before I could add the bit about our deal."
"Well hears to great deals and lots of money," Chuck raised his glass for a toast and Ted accepted it laughing.
For the rest of the lunch, the two of them talked buisness, possible directions for the company and what areas Roark Industries could help Chuck.
Chuck was relaxing, enjoying himself when he saw a waitress come and deliver food for the table next to them. To his horror he recognized her as La Ciudad.
"Excuse me; I got to go the bathroom." Chuck leaped out of his seat and started to desperately try and contact Casey, "Casey La Ciudad is here, she's the waitress." He hurried to the bathroom and locked the door. He didn't see what happened but he could hear a lot of breaking glass, a couple grunts, a silenced shot and then nothing.
He quietly opened the door to see Casey standing there; breathing quickly with a couple big gashes on his face, at his feet was the now deceased La Ciudad, with two shots at her heart.
Lou opened the door and saw the body and Casey had to quickly cover a scram, Chuck ran over to her, a little shocked himself, "Lou, quite, it was an assassin trying to kill me, but don't yell, it would start a panic."
Lou nodded and tried to compose herself, "Oh my god, why would someone want to kill you Chuck,"
Chuck and Casey looked at each other and Casey answered, "Remember ma'am Mr. Bartowski just made a business deal worth over 100 million dollars, that's plenty of reasons to want him dead."
Lou just nodded, "What do I do, have you called the police."
Casey realized he had to be careful here, he had already called the CIA but didn't want the local police to come into this he decided to go on the side of caution, "I have called the FBI, this may be related to the announcement, and since he now is kind of a government employee they will want in" Casey paused to try and figure out the best way to say the next question, "could you try and close the restaurant, we don't want a panic."
Lou accepted this without a question, "Sure I can pull the fire alarm."
"That would be perfect, do that now."
As Lou pulled the fire alarm, they found the restaurant in a state of panic. Chuck caught up to Ted as he exited the restaurant, "Hey I'm sorry for this, you never know what's going to happen I guess, I'll talk to you later, and your lawyers will probably be pretty busy calling mine."
"That's the truth."
Chuck walked him to his car before turning back and trying to help Casey figure out what to do with the dead body.
Later that day, Ted Roark was sitting at his desk when Drew came in, "Sir you were right, we've seen men carrying a body out of the restaurant, our sources believe that its La Ciudad."
Ted leaned in, "Dead you say?"
"Yes sir, why is that so important?"
"It means that Chuck may be working on his own, the CIA probably wouldn't want to lose the information that is in La Ciudad, and they would take her alive."
"Sir, I'm still not sure why you are focusing so much attention on the Chuck Bartowski, yes I agree he is hiding something and probably has many contacts in the intelligence community but 125 million dollars, that's a lot of money for some information."
Ted laughed, "Two things; one, it is high yes but it's a good investment, and two, I'm not concerned with Chuck, I'm concerned with his father, if Chuck rises high enough, fast enough, his father will have to take notice and contact him, and after that I'll finally be able to get my hands on Orion, and with him, the Intersect will finally be in Ring possession."
So Ted Roark is the main villian and has an opening with Chuck, you like where its going yes, no?
NEXT CHAPTER, Carina comes for a visit, what will she think of Sarahs new cover?
