According to 4 out of 5 dentists, I don't ask "Chuck." Though honestly, I don't know what dentists know about copyright law.
The fifth just kept going on and on about flossing. To be honest, I'm not sure he even heard the question.
Chapter 3
Eleanor Woodcomb blinked in surprise at the question. General Beckman watched her site there quietly, before the look of determination returned to her face, her jaw once again set in resolution.
"You think I don't know my brother? I watched him grow up. I lived with him for years after he was kicked of Stanford. I know what's important to him. I know what he wants. Had you given him the chance, he'd have been happy at one of those jobs you kept him from taking."
Beckman leaned forward. "Maybe. But I distinctly remember when he first came into this office to apply for a job, and saw me there, sitting in the store manager's chair. He was relieved."
The General wasn't sure why she seemed to be enjoying this. She'd always liked debates, of course. She never would have gotten as far as she had without being good at persuasive speaking. But that was about foreign policy and tactics, not about one person's happiness. She didn't have time for this. She should be downstairs, inspecting Castle.
Still, she sat there, waiting for Ellie Bartowski to respond.
"What's the matter with you?" Jack Burton's question returned Chuck to his present surroundings.
"Uh, sorry. I was just…concerned by what I saw," Chuck quickly covered. "I hate to tell you this, but those guys aren't from some start-up internet company. They're terrorists."
"I beg your pardon?" Jack asked. "And how exactly do you know this?"
"I just do," Chuck replied tersely. "You'll have to trust me on this. The government has had their eye on them for a while, and that commercial they wanted to make was actually going to be used as a way to communicate while staying completely above surveillance."
"Right in front of the eyes of the entire nation," Jack chuckled. "Got to admit, it's pretty ballsy."
"Well, ballsy or no, they plan to do a whole lot of damage to a very large city."
"Well it's a good thing I didn't complete their ad, then." Jack gave Chuck a self-satisfied smirk. "They should have known not to trust me."
"Well, they probably wanted somebody small-time enough to be under the radar." Chuck gave his prospective father-in-law a pointed glance. "And one they could easily eliminate when the time came, without being missed."
"You know, given your relationship with my daughter, you should be sucking up to me rather than insulting me." Jack watched Chuck pull a phone out of his pocket. "What are you doing?"
"I need to report this."
"So you're just going to turn me in?"
Chuck sighed. "You could testify, you know. Describe your meetings with them, who you met. It will make it easier to bring them in."
Jack shook his head. "That's not going to happen."
"Why not?"
"Because they're already here."
"'It occurs to me that you only need a tongue to talk, my friend. Removing a couple of other appendages, say an arm or a leg, won't prevent you from telling me what I want. It might even help.'"
Morgan said all of this is a hissed voice, which would have given Devon chills if it wasn't for the bad parody of a … East St. Louis accent he was using.
"What happened then?" Devon asked.
"Well, Ashton Kutcher comes up to me with this really nasty knife. Strapped down like I was, I couldn't do a thing. But I wasn't going to talk. We Grimes come from tough stock."
Devon chose to let Morgan have his moment, though he wondered if he'd be able to do some 'fact-checking' with Chuck later on. He sat down in the exam room chair, and motioned for Morgan to continue his story.
"But then, this other voice said, out of nowhere, 'Hello, Ashton.'"
"Now what?"
"Well, we all turned to look, and there was John Mayer. He had a gun, pointed directly at Ashton Kutcher."
"No way!"
"I was surprised too. But I don't think Kutcher was. He just looked at Mayer for a while and said, 'I was wondering when this day would happen. Planning to go into business for yourself, are you?'"
"'I've found some buyers, and it seems like you're just in the way of the deal we've made together.'"
"Really. And I suppose you think you can just take the…cheese grater from me?'"
"'I'm sure I can figure something out.'"
Morgan leaned back on the exam room bed. "Ashton Kutcher chuckled," he said, continuing on, clearly enjoying telling the story. "'Enough of this. Fergie, kill him.'"
"Fergie raised her gun, but not at John Mayer. She fired, and Ashton Kutcher fell."
Devon jumped to his feet. "No way! You mean, Fergie was with John Mayer, and not with Ashton Kutcher?"
"Yeah, that's what I…" Morgan trailed off, his eyes focused on the door. Devon turned to see the nurse standing there, a wry smile on her face.
"Um, Kelly. We were just…" Having Chuck's and Morgan's secret CIA identities passed around the hospital was a bad thing. Especially since it could get back to Ellie.
"I was just bringing you the X-ray," the nurse said. "And letting you know that there's a ruptured appendix in Exam room 2." She handed Devon the x-ray and turned to leave. "You know," she said, just before walking out the door, "the doctor's lounge doesn't just stock People Magazine. There's Time, Sports Illustrated, and Burbank Living. But I'll let you get back to your celeb gossip for now, but that appendix won't wait for long."
With that, she left the room, leaving Devon and Morgan to stare at each other blankly.
"Of course!" Chuck's sister finally said, "the reason Chuck was happy about returning to the CIA is Sarah. He's happy he gets to work alongside her again."
Rather than respond, the General reached downward and opened one of the desk drawers. Back in Washington, she always had a bottle of scotch conveniently at hand. Unfortunately, a search through Grimes' desk only revealed several candy bars and cans of grape sodas. Shaking her head, she looked back at Ellie. It was clear this conversation was going to continue for a while, and scotch would have been a help.
"When your brother and Agent Walker first started working for me," she began, "it became clear pretty quickly that there was some sort of attraction between the two of them. They each had their own clumsy ways of trying to hide it, but they never worked."
"At first I wanted to stop it." The General raised a hand when she saw Ellie's face darken. "It's my job to ensure that my team is fully focused on protecting this country, and any romantic entanglements could get in the way of that."
"I went so far as to set up an investigation of the nature of their relationship. Had they failed, I was ready to transfer Agent Walker to Alaska, or some other remote outpost. But I realized that, surprisingly, their feelings, awkward and messy as they were, actually seemed to help them succeed as agents."
Of course, the truth of the decision had been a bit more cold-blooded than that. When they had actually been foolish enough to tell her about their relationship, her choice had been based on a balancing of risk. And the improved performance that seemed to occur when Bartowski and Walker were happy outweighed the risks caused by their unwillingness to risk each other's lives when the situation depended on it. And ultimately, their feelings would be there whether they acted them or not. At least if they were sleeping together, they'd be a little less stressed.
She said none of this to Ellie. Instead she said, "But I found myself wondering about why their dynamic worked. Why something as unpredictable as an emotional entanglement could make your brother a better agent. And you know what I came up with?"
Ellie shook her head.
"When they were on missions together, Agent Walker always provided support, encouragement. Told him he'd done a good job when he had, and helped him learn from his mistakes. It was more than what you'd get from teammates. It was more like what one expects from one's family."
"I've always supported Chuck!" Ellie retorted. "I've been there for him, looked after him, encouraged him…"
"To do what he wants to do?" the General finished the other woman's sentence.
"Damn." Chuck didn't particularly want to do this. Especially without Sarah or Casey as backup.
He looked up at the TV screen, and saw three men dressed in black move stealthily around the building. One moved towards the front entrance, while a second went around to the back. The third man stayed behind, apparently guarding against any attempts at escape. All three carried automatic weapons.
"Well, I guess there's no time now," Chuck announced, swallowing the sour taste of fear in his mouth. "You'd better stay here."
"What are you going to do?" Jack asked.
"Whatever I can."
While Jack watched, Chuck opened his briefcase and pulled aside the false bottom. As he retrieved the gun from underneath, he saw the other man's eyes widen. "Relax, it's a tranq."
"You know, one of these days you'll have to tell me who you and my daughter work for."
"That's up to her. I'll be right back."
Stepping back into the main room, Chuck ducked behind a large stack of boxes. Peeking to the side, he saw one of the men enter the room from the outside door. As he quietly maneuvered to find a better angle, the familiar flash began. Chuck fired, and the man went down.
The commotion seemed to make enough noise that the front door opened and the other man peeked inside. As soon as he stepped in the building, though, a set of metal crowbars fell from their awkward perch over the door and onto the man.
"Why do you think I told you to take the front door?" Jack asked from the front door. Chuck silently thanked himself for listening to the man, and that he hadn't done anything to deserve becoming a victim to his booby traps.
But there was still one more armed man outside. "Stay here!" Chuck hissed, and walked out through the back door. Hopefully, the sentry had stayed in front, and Chuck could sneak up on him.
Unfortunately, the other man had been waiting for him.
"So," Morgan finally said, pointing to the x-ray in Devon's hand. "What's wrong with me?"
"No way, man. Finish the story first."
Morgan shrugged. "Ok. So right after John Mayer shot Ashton Kutcher, he and Fergie turned their eyes to me. 'Who's he?' Mayer asked.'"
"'He was lurking outside your meeting. I think he's CIA, or NSA, or something like that.'"
"John Mayer looked me over. 'This guy?' Isn't he kind of short to be a spy?'"
"I totally thought that was unfair. I'm at the 20th percentile for my age and ethnicity. But anyway, John Mayer then said, 'Either way, we should probably get rid of him.' So I'm looking at the wrong end of a gun again."
"Then there was a crash, as Chuck and Casey burst through the door. Chuck comes in and does his crazy kung-fu thing against John Mayer, and he's down on the ground."
Devon believed it. He'd seen Chuck fight before, and in a word it was…spectacular.
"Fergie was about to shoot Chuck, but Casey came up behind her, gun drawn, and said, 'Don't even think about it, Sister.'" Devon was surprised at the accuracy of Morgan's Casey impersonation. It was way better than his Ashton Kutcher.
"Chuck untied me and got me back to my feet. As we were about to leave, Chuck turned to Casey. 'What about the cheese grater?'"
"Casey smiled grimly. 'Not to worry. I'll get them to tell me. But let's get out of here. I've had just about enough of this place.'"
"'We're leaving now? Aren't we at least going to get some St. Louis food while we're here?'"
"But my protest, reasonable as it was, was ignored. We had to head back. Once we were in Burbank, Casey did his scary interrogation thing, and we were able to learn where the…cheese grater was being kept." Morgan finished his story, and leaned back in satisfaction. "So, what's up with my arm?"
"Oh. Just a sprain, as it turns out, nothing broken. Just put some ice on it, and take it easy."
Morgan jumped to his feet. "Great! Got a date with Alex tonight. Thanks a lot, doc."
"Wait!" Devon interrupted. "You told me that whole story, but you never hurt your arm. How did it happen?"
"Oh, right." Morgan turned back. "I fell down Castle steps when we got back. See ya later, doc."
Before he could react, Chuck was pushed into the building's wall, the tranq gun falling harmlessly to the ground. "Where's Jack Burton?" the man growled.
"He's not here," Chuck mumbled, feeling the muzzle of the gun against his ear.
"I don't believe you," came the snarled reply.
Thankfully, before the debate could continue, the flash kicked in. Chuck kicked behind, knocking the man down. A second well-timed move knocked the gun away. The man was well trained, but not Intersect trained, and soon was on the ground.
"Well if you were asking for permission for my daughter's hand, you got my blessing."
Chuck turned to see Jack standing at the doorway, looking down at the unconscious assassin in wonder.
"Uh, thanks. But you may want to clear out of here, Mr. Burton. I've got to call this in."
Jack nodded. "Call me Jack. And listen, I can return the favor. I've got a guy that deals in jewelry…"
Chuck raised a hand in protest. "You want to sell me a knock-off engagement ring to give to your daughter?"
Jack smiled. "Just testing you."
"Well I'm all set, thanks."
Jack turned to leave, his arms holding a bag filled with what Chuck guessed was everything valuable he'd kept in the office. "Take care of my daughter, Chuck," he called as he left.
"We take care of each other." The other man didn't turn, and quickly had disappeared out of sight.
"At least he's stopped calling me Schnook," Chuck said as he went to contact Beckman.
Hoping to break the other woman's silence, General Beckman meaningfully glanced at her watch. It was clear that she'd made her point, and she hoped that was enough to bring the conversation to a close. She sympathized with the other woman, or at least she would when she had more time.
"Can you guarantee that he'll be safe?" Ellie finally asked.
The General hated questions like that. They always seemed like a trap. "I can't make that guarantee. What I can tell you," she quickly added, "is that Chuck has become an exemplary agent. And that's not just because of the Intersect. And I can assure you that Agent Walker will do everything in her power to keep Chuck safe. Her devotion to his welfare is about as complete as I have ever seen."
The General wasn't going to provide any details. Telling Ellie about Chuck's recent capture and rescue would only make things worse.
"And I can also assure you that having Chuck on our side, protecting this country, makes everyone safer, including your family." Beckman gestured to Ellie's stomach.
Ellie listened to all of this, but still shook her head when the General had finished. "It's not enough," shook her head.
"It's the best I can offer."
The younger woman once again sat there quietly. The General was about to clear her throat to subtly get things moving when Ellie began to push herself to her feet. The General got up to offer her a hand, but she was refused.
"I guess I need to have a heart-to-heart talk with my brother," she sighed. "But I'll consider what you've said."
"Good."
"You know," Ellie said once she was comfortably standing, "things would have been much easier if you had been open and honest from the beginning."
The General shrugged. "We're the CIA. We don't do open and honest."
The doctor stared at Beckman, and then chuckled. As she reached for the door, she said, "You might be right about Chuck, about what this job means to him. But I don't think you understand him and Sarah as much as you think. There's more to love than just camaraderie and teamwork."
Beckman knew she was probably right. That part of her life hadn't gone entirely dormant, after all. Feeling the need to say something further, she asked, "Boy or girl?"
Ellie smiled briefly. "A girl."
"Don't just treat her like a girl all of the time. We don't all turn out to be ballerinas and princesses. Remember, she can do anything she wants."
"Of course," Ellie responded as she walked away, "she's a Bartowski."
The General had seen enough to know that the younger woman was right, so she wasn't going to debate that. She didn't have time anyway. She had a Castle to inspect. And judging by the message on her phone, yet another Bartowski to deal with.
End
As I was writing the last chapter, I realized that The Chuck/Jack story seemed to be quite similar to the movie "Grosse Point Blank." I figured at that point I should just embrace the rip-off…er, homage, and go with it. I stopped short of having Chuck smash the TV on one of the assassin's head. And besides, that movie has been referenced multiple times by the show itself, and they don't own the movie any more than I do.
One thing I suppose I do "own" is Kelly, who has now appeared in three of my stories. She always seems to turn up in awkward situations too. Not sure if there's any significance to her, other than my laziness when it comes up to making up character names.
Well, I hope you enjoyed this three-parter. I'm planning a next one, tentatively titled "Hostile Takeovers on a Tuesday."
As always, reviews are greatly appreciated!
