Hello. Hope everyone is doing well. Things have finally quieted down around here. I actually moved to a new apartment in the interim and was having some difficulty working this chapter out the way I wanted. And I'm not sure I succeeded. But hopefully I kept true to the original material (still the property of NBC and Fake Empire Productions) while adding little bits here and there from the AU part of this story. I also tried to get Carina more involved in the story (she plays a big part in a season 2 chapter that also goes a bit into her background), but she's every bit of a capable agent as the rest, if a little wild. Also, I hope the 'truth' part of Chuck vs. the Truth worked as well here as it did on the show, given you can't have Lou in this story. After all, she'd know Chuck was dating Sarah.
BTW, I do find it funny that I got the dates to match when UCLA actually played Stanford this upcoming week, which is why the game was suddenly on a Thursday instead of a Saturday.
Anyway, enjoy the chapter and please leave reviews!
Stanford University - Palo Alto, CA
October 15, 2015
5:45 PM PDT
"Now THIS is what I call a tailgate!"
Devon couldn't believe it. Not only did Chuck change his mind about attending the football game, but he managed to bring John Casey and Carina Miller with him. He thought it was a bit weird Chuck decided to change his mind and leave Sarah behind, but Chuck had told him Sarah insisted he go. Not only that, Carina appeared to be the Martha Stewart of tailgating, given the spread of food and varieties of drinks she procured…including lots of expensive beer for his fraternity brothers. If only Ellie could have joined them, but at least Sarah and Jimmy Slade were bringing her dinner in Los Angeles as a thank you for taking care of Sarah in the hospital and to boost her spirits after losing her patient the other day.
"Overdoing it a bit here, Miller?" Casey quietly growled at her.
"Big picture, Casey," she replied. "The library is off the quad and that's where a good part of the tailgating is going on. Since we'll draw attention one way or another, we may as well make a big splash."
"A big splash? Roman orgies were more subtle than this."
"That's because you decided to be in R.O.T.C. at Rutgers during the Reagan era. The one thing you learn going to school at Alabama is how to tailgate. And being a cheerleader certainly helps."
"Yeah, particularly when you sleep with the entire football team," Casey said with a significant amount of snark.
"Not…the entire team," Carina replied in offense.
"Are you two done?" Chuck exhaled, already regretting making the drive up to Stanford. "If I wanted to hear a lot of BS, I'd listen to Devon talk about how UCLA will kick Stanford's ass."
"Hey, the Bruins have owned The Cardinal, Chuck," Devon protested.
"And Arizona State owned UCLA two weeks ago. At least Stanford lost to a ranked team."
Devon scoffed. "From the Big Ten. That just got their butts whipped."
"And how long will this conversation go?" Casey whispered angrily at Chuck. "We have work to do."
Chuck sighed. Although he was relieved to end the incessant argument with Devon over a football team he didn't even follow during school, Casey's constant badgering and Carina's constant flirting with the students was getting quite tiring.
"If you'll excuse us," Chuck said to Devon. "I'm going to take these two on the Chuck Bartowski Memorial Tour. Let me know if any rabid Stanford fans attack you so I can egg them on."
Chuck headed through the quad towards the library with Casey and Carina right behind him.
"Plant a Stanford tree?"
Casey turned to see a student holding a seedling in a square of dirt. "A renewable resource for your children's future?"
Casey stared in complete condescension. "Want to save our environment, huh." He grabbed the flyer the student was carrying and crumpled it. "Take a shower, hippie."
The student looked at Casey in shock as Chuck and Carina pulled him away quickly. "Sorry," Carina replied. "Contract negotiations. He's all stressed out."
They got away from the tables and barbecues set up around the quad. "So glad you remember people have seen you on TV, Case," Chuck said in aggravation. "Who do you root for? Death?"
"Leave the quips to me," Casey hissed.
"The library's this way." Chuck, Casey, and Carina headed across the quad in that direction.
Echo Park – Los Angeles, CA
October 15, 2015
6:15 PM PDT
Sarah knocked on the door to Ellie's and Chuck's apartment. Jimmy was right behind her, loaded down with several containers of food and a bottle of wine to match. It was the one talent where he was better than the rest of the team and couldn't deny it. Sarah knew from his file that he had spent three months undercover as a chef six years ago for a popular Manhattan restaurant trying to collect intel on a rogue French agent. When the team got a rare Thanksgiving off last year, Sarah didn't let him get away without cooking everyone a holiday turkey with all of the trimmings. Given it was Sarah's first Thanksgiving since she was a child…and Jimmy's first Thanksgiving ever…the team wanted to make the most of it. Even Casey turned away from watching football from time to time.
Ellie opened the door. Sarah and Jimmy couldn't miss the despondent look on her face. "How are you doing?" Sarah asked her.
Ellie huffed in frustration. "We did everything we could to bring that man back, but we failed. The autopsy said the man was poisoned. Who would do something like that?"
It piqued the interest of both Sarah and Jimmy, but they had to stay in character as actors. "I'm sorry, Doc," Jimmy said. "Hope the food we brought will help you take your mind off of things."
Ellie stood aside to let them in. "I thought I left this crap behind after I finished my ER stint. Gunshot victims, stabbings, domestic violence. Now this comes up."
Jimmy went into the kitchen to organize the meal. "I'm sorry, Ellie," Sarah said gently. "I wish I knew what we could do to make things better."
Ellie waved her hand dismissively. "Not your fault. I've lost patients before; I shouldn't be getting all bent out of shape over…oh, God!"
"What?"
Ellie pointed to the laundry basket. "Those stupid porno shorts Devon owns! I mean CLEARLY Mrs. Heditsian likes to enjoy all the hills and valleys. But really, REALLY, they leave, like, nothing to the imagination!"
"Um, OK…" Sarah said carefully as she sat down on the couch, completely unprepared for Ellie's behavior.
"And 'awesome'! Everything is awesome to him! Toilet paper commercials are awesome as far as he's concerned! Tell me something, Sarah. If everything is awesome and there is no un-awesome, isn't awesome by definition just mediocre?"
Jimmy came out from the kitchen as Ellie continued her tirade. "I can't even remember the last time he did something nice for me! You know, he buys me something for no reason because it's Monday?"
"You just have to talk to him," Jimmy said. "Most guys are clueless when it comes to relationships but they'll always give you what you want if you tell them."
Ellie turned towards Jimmy. "You know what I want?" She pointed to Sarah. "I want what Chuck and Sarah have! THAT'S what I want! The way the two of them look at each other all the time. They are so in love! They make Romeo and Juliet look like brother and sister!"
Ellie flopped onto the couch next to Sarah. "I have known him since the day he was born…obviously. When people would ask him what he wanted to be when he grew up, he would always say the same thing: 'a big boy'. How cute is that?
"And now he IS a big boy. And I tell that he is because he is with a big…" Ellie's eyes drifted down to Sarah's breasts. "…big, big girl."
Sarah looked apprehensively at Jimmy. "Something is very wrong."
"Yeah, I agree," he replied. "I mean, you're physique is more athletic than anything. And thank God for that. You'd look ridiculous walking around like a Kardashian. Not to mention having to drive a spike through your brain to get to their IQ level."
"Not…helping," Sarah hissed.
"Sarah, do me a favor," Ellie said, her eyes becoming more unfocused. "You have hairdressers on set. See what they can do for Chuck. His hair is starting to make funny animal shapes."
"Ellie, do you feel alright?" Jimmy asked. "Do you want us to take you to the hospital?"
She smacked her lips. "Words taste like peaches." She then looked towards the laundry basket again. "Oh, there's a pair of shorts in there you can take with you if you wish. But they might be a bit small on you." She leaned towards Sarah and winked at her. "I hope!"
She began to laugh, making Sarah and Jimmy freak out even more. "Seriously, I love my brother, but what are you doing with him when you've got that staring you in the face every week!" she exclaimed as she pointed at Jimmy. "Man, if it wasn't for being faithful, I'd rip his clothes off and ride his…"
Ellie's eyes rolled upward and she collapsed into Sarah's lap.
"Shit," Jimmy cursed. "I'll call 911."
Sarah extracted herself from under Ellie and laid her gently on the couch. "I'll call Casey and Carina and tell them to get back here with Chuck and Devon."
Jimmy pulled out his smartphone, which started beeping incessantly. "Hang on. I'm picking up radio signals around here."
"From where?"
"Let me narrow the band," he replied as he made the adjustments to the program on his phone. He then walked towards Ellie. The closer he got, the stronger the signal became. Finally, he held the phone by her ear.
"The signal's coming from her; something by her ear is burying the needle."
Sarah brushed Ellie's hair back from her neck and found an anomalous piece of skin behind her ear. She pulled at it gently and looked at it in shock.
"A radio transmitter," she said.
Jimmy's look matched hers. "Whoever poisoned Ellie's patient must be going after her now."
"But why?"
Jimmy threw his hands up. "I don't know, but we better get everybody back here now."
Sarah dialed Casey's number. "Casey, we have a…I can't hear you!"
Sarah recoiled from the cacophony of sounds coming from the other end of the phone. "I think they're under attack," she said frightfully.
Cecil H. Green Library, Stanford University - Palo Alto, CA
October 15, 2015
6:15 PM PDT
Chuck, Casey, and Carina made their way up the stairs to the third floor of the library. Chuck found the section where the book should have been, but it wasn't there.
"We're too late," Casey gritted through clenched teeth. "Magnus already has the intel."
Chuck hung his head, upset they went through all of that effort for nothing. But then he remembered playing assassination games with Bryce.
"Hold on a second…"
He slowed down that scene in his mind where Bryce seemed to have found a dart out of nowhere to nail Chuck in the forehead with it, even though Chuck was certain Bryce was out.
He felt underneath the shelf. Then a big grin came across his face. He pulled down the hidden compartment under the shelf and pulled out a CD-ROM.
"Gotcha!" Chuck said.
"The intel," Casey said, suddenly very impressed.
"The book number was just a way to mark the spot for the professor."
"Then we need to get out of here before Magnus realizes the book he has is worthless," Carina said.
She then glanced behind her to see Magnus at the end of the aisle with a pair of hitmen. "Chuck, run! Head for the back door!"
Casey and Carina charged down the aisle after Magnus while Chuck ran in the other direction with the intel. He made it back out to the quad but had several of Magnus' goons in hot pursuit. He ran back and forth through the tailgaters, hoping to lose the men chasing him. He pulled down the banner to plant a Stanford tree, forcing one agent to crash into a table. He ran back towards Awesome's tailgate and ducked under the table, crawling from one end to the other.
Before he could get his bearings, Chuck was roughly pulled to his feet…by Casey. One of Magnus' men came up to them from behind, only to wind up on the receiving end of a vicious elbow by Casey. Another tried to go at them only to receive a spinning back kick to the head from Carina.
"We have to go," Carina said.
"I swear this school has it in for me!" Chuck said.
The three ran into the science building and snuck into the main lecture room. Chuck immediately went to the computer set up under the podium and inserted the disc.
"I need to know why I'm in the Intersect," he said as the disc booted up. "Wait a minute."
Carina looked at the screen. "That's testing data."
"And videotaped interviews. But these are all students."
"They must be students that were recruited into the CIA by Flemming. Ten years' worth!"
"No wonder Magnus wanted it so badly," Casey said. "Foreign governments would pay a fortune for them."
"Look, right here in 2002, it says Bryce Larkin. Bryce joined the CIA our junior year?" Chuck asked.
"That's what he was after," Casey said.
"Wait! There I am in 2003! I never applied to be in the CIA."
"Chuck, get down!" Carina shouted as Magnus and his men entered at the top of the lecture hall and began to open fire. The three ducked behind the teacher's desk. Casey and Carina began to return fire, but they were becoming outgunned very quickly.
"Don't you think this would be a good time for me to wait in the car?" Chuck ejected the CD from the computer. "I have an idea: GET ME OUT OF HERE!"
"When I tell you to, run out the side door," Casey ordered. "Protect that disc!"
Carina shot at several beakers on top of the teacher's desk to create a smokescreen. Chuck bolted out the side door as Casey and Carina kept firing away at Magnus and his men.
Chuck ran upstairs to a computer lab on the second floor. He re-inserted the CD and scrolled to the students who were recruited and were currently on the campus. He clicked on the first name he saw and dialed the number listed with his mobile: Glenda Mitchell.
"Hi, is this Glenda Mitchell? We are in the science hall lecture room, and it's an emergency. Bring lots of big guns."
"I'm sorry, but whoever this is, you've got the wrong number," Glenda replied.
Chuck froze; he thought that would work. "Oh, there's a code phrase. Wait! Are you coming to the toga party?"
Glenda immediately hung up and bolted for the science building. Chuck went to the next name on the list. He called name after name, catching students selling Stanford trees, in lecture halls, even tailgating at the game.
"We have a situation. Bring ammunition and anything you need for killing bad guys."
"Are you coming to the toga party?"
"Are you coming to the toga party?"
"Are you coming to the toga party?"
Chuck finished calling everyone on the list currently at Stanford, making sure he asked each one if they were coming to the toga party. He then scrolled back to 2003 and took a look at his name on the list.
He had no idea Magnus was right behind him.
~/^\~
Casey and Carina continued to fire away at Magnus' men, but they were outnumbered and didn't hold the high ground. Casey's phone began to ring.
"Busy right now, Walker," Casey said tersely before hanging up. He checked his Sig Sauer P229. "I've only got two left."
Carina checked her Sig. "I have half a mag."
"Put down your weapons and stand up! Hands where we can see them!" one of Magnus' men shouted.
"I'm going to go for it," Carina said.
"Just like always," Casey replied.
"You up for it?"
"You bet. I hate long goodbyes."
"Ah, that's the Johnny I slept with. All the sophistication of a caveman, but a whole lot of fun. And maybe you can pick better boxer shorts in the next life."
The two stood up, ready to go Butch-and-Sundance, when students started streaming into the lecture hall. All of them were heavily armed.
"Why don't you put your weapons down," Glenda told Magnus' men.
"Someone must have called the cavalry," Casey said in amazement.
"Thank God," Carina replied. "I had only one shot left."
The students were quite pleased to help out their fellow agents. Glenda looked to her right. "Aren't you in Econ with me?"
~/^\~
Chuck barely had time to duck as Magnus fired his crossbow at the computer, shorting it out completely. He crawled across the floor between the computers in a feeble attempt to get away. Magnus walked up to him, took the disc out of Chuck's hand, and aimed his crossbow right between Chuck's eyes.
"Please don't," Chuck begged. "Please don't, please don't, please don't…"
"Don't."
Magnus turned to see a female student fly through the air and drop him with a hard kick to the sternum, knocking him out with a knee to his head.
"You must be Chuck Bartowski," the woman said. "I just got your message. Are you OK?"
"I'm just glad you check your voicemail," Chuck said in profound relief as he picked up the disc.
~/^\~
Casey watched as several agents from the San Francisco office took Magnus and his men away. He dialed Sarah's phone.
"Situation is stable here, Walker," he told her. "What is going on there?"
"We took Ellie to the hospital. She passed out during dinner."
"Told you Slade can't cook worth a rat's ass. He needs a recipe to boil water."
"She was poisoned. At least that's what we think happened. The patient she lost the other day died of a poison as well. We need all of you to get back here now, including Devon."
"On it. I'll get a plane ready." Casey turned to Carina. "Go get Chuck. I have to find Devon. Ellie's in trouble."
Carina ran out of the lecture hall to find Chuck. This was news she was not accustomed to delivering. She usually left that to Sarah. And given everyone's efforts to keep Chuck's CIA life separate from his family life, this head-on collision of the two worlds would hit especially hard.
West Side Medical Center – Los Angeles, CA
October 15, 2015
9:30 PM PDT
Chuck looked at his sister, who was still unconscious. Devon sat by the bed holding her hand. The one thing Chuck never wanted to have happen was for his new 'career' to affect his family and friends, and now it had in the worst possible way.
Devon slowly got up and turned to Chuck with welled eyes. "I'm…going to bring her lucky sweater up here. It's in her locker. Can't hurt, right?"
Chuck smiled. "Of course not." The two hugged and Devon left the room.
Chuck sat in the same seat where Devon was. "I'm going to fix this, Ellie. I swear. I know you think I'm just…Chuck, your screw-up little brother. But there's a lot about me you don't know. See I'm…I'm also Chuck, the guy with all these important government secrets in my brain."
He took her hand. "I can make this better. I will make this better. Everything is so different now, Ellie. Everything is so different. I used to be able to come to you and ask your advice about anything. And now my whole life is, like, a lie."
He gently squeezed Ellie's hand, even though she didn't react. He took one more look at the monitor, whose droned beeping only served to increase Chuck's fear. He heard someone gently clear their throat behind him. He turned to see Sarah and Casey waiting outside. He slowly stood and walked out of the room.
"Are you OK?" Sarah asked, gently taking his hand.
"This…this is not what I wanted. How did this happen?"
"We have our best medical team trying to determine the poison they gave to Ellie and work on an antidote."
"Work on it? There's not enough time! She said the guy she found never recovered! She could only have a few hours left!"
"Chuck, we have nothing to go on right now," Casey said. "Carina is pulling the file on Ellie's patient, and Slade is tearing apart her office to see if she was handed anything. But we need a lead and we need it badly."
Carina came running down the hall with a file folder. "OK, Ellie's patient was a Mason Whitney, a high-level programmer. According to Beckman, he had nuclear intel from a top-secret program named Project Sanctuary. The data from the project was embedded onto a computer chip, which disappeared when he did. Whoever finds that chip basically has a skeleton key to all of our nuclear facilities."
She held up a small object. "And this was placed behind his ear. Look familiar?"
Sarah took it and examined it before handing it to Chuck. "The same bug we found on Ellie."
Chuck studied it. "So the bad guy was able to…" He went silent as he had a flash, seeing images of the Colosseum in Rome, a nuclear missile, cash, vials of poisoned being mixed, a set of x-rays, and a clear picture of the bad guy, who was standing on crutches.
"The bad guy's name is Riordan Payne. Used to be an Olympic gymnast, blew out his knee. Now he sells hard-to-find items like nuclear codes to hard-to-find people. Lots of people would like to spend lots of cash on these codes."
Casey took out a box which contained the bug they found on Ellie. "Soundproof box. Don't want Payne to know we're on to him. I'll see if our engineers can reverse the signal and track him."
Chuck was incredulous. "There's no time!" He snatched the box out of Casey's hand and opened it. "Found the codes. Can't believe where Mason Whitney hid them. I'm going to keep them on the lady doctor until we can move them safely."
Casey looked ready to kill Chuck until he realized Chuck just made a brilliant move. "Now Payne's going to come to us. Not bad, Bartowski." He snatched the box back from Chuck. "But do that ever again and I'll kill you."
"Carina, take Chuck down to Ellie's office and help Jimmy find the chip," Sarah said. "Casey and I will set a trap for Payne."
~/^\~
Riordan Payne moved down the hallway, his tracking device having picked up the bug he put on the doctor. He wasn't sure if the doctor had the codes on her, but he had few leads right now. He entered her room to find her asleep on her side. He pulled back the blanket, ready to search for the missing codes.
Sarah's hand shot up and put an armbar on Payne.
"Freeze!" Casey shouted as he entered the room with his gun drawn.
Payne looked undeterred. He threw his other elbow back to knock Sarah away and grabbed the bed, swinging through the air to kick Casey's gun out of his hands. But it gave Sarah enough time to pull out her gun.
"OK, I've got what you want," Payne said, holding up a small green vial. "The antidote to save your doctor friend. Give it to her. She might live. Just trade me for the codes."
He then held up another vial, which was larger and clearly not the same contents as the antidote. "Or I can poison all of you and force you to tell me where you've hidden my codes. And then you'll die, too. Just like the doctor. Your choice."
~/^\~
"Any luck?" Chuck asked as he ran into Ellie's office with Carina right on his heels.
"Worst scavenger hunt…ever," Jimmy growled. "I've been through this office a half-dozen times already and can't find anything."
"We're running out of time, Jimmy," Carina said as she started looking as well.
"I know that! But a computer chip can be as small as a fingernail. You can hide it anyplace. I don't have any better way of finding it!"
"My sister's life depends on that chip!" Chuck shouted as he went to Ellie's desk and ripped it open, hoping to find the microchip.
"Chuck, worst case scenario, Sarah and Casey capture Payne and make him give us the antidote," Carina said. "Casey hasn't tortured anybody in months; he'd probably beg us to let him interrogate Payne."
"And what if he doesn't break fast enough? Ellie doesn't have enough time to pin her hopes on Casey, no matter how scary he might be."
Chuck threw the coat rack holding Ellie's lab coat aside to search the shelves. He then saw part of a gold chain fall out of the pocket of the lab coat. He pulled out the chain and saw the locket attached to it. He had a flash, showing a nuclear explosion, Whitney's ID card, and the folder on Project Sanctuary.
"I've got it!" Chuck cried. He sprinted out of the room.
"No, Chuck. Wait!" Jimmy shouted as Carina and he gave chase.
~/^\~
"And then you'll die, too. Just like the doctor. Your choice."
"I found them! I found them!" Chuck shouted as he ran into the room. "The codes were on a necklace. I found them."
He crashed into a cart that knocked Payne over. Payne dropped the vial of poison, which shattered on the floor. The poison filled the air, and all four of them were doused with the truth serum.
Payne grabbed the necklace, knocked Chuck backwards, and ran from the room. Sarah and Casey shook off the shock of being poisoned and went in pursuit. Payne ran down the hallway, shoving anyone out of the way who blocked his path. He looked back briefly to see Sarah and Casey bearing down on him. As he turned back, he was nailed with a clothesline by Jimmy. He fell to the ground and the vial and his tracking device flew into the air.
"The antidote!" Sarah screamed.
Jimmy ducked down, and Carina pushed off of his back to launch herself into the air. She dove for the antidote and caught it before it hit the ground.
Payne got up and ran. Casey was about to give chase again when Sarah stopped him. "Casey, wait! What about Chuck?"
Sarah took the antidote from Carina and handed it to Chuck as Jimmy retrieved the tracking device. "No, no. This is for Ellie," Chuck said in no uncertain terms.
"No, I'm sorry. There is no debate. It has to be you. You're the Intersect."
"I won't take it knowing Ellie will die without it, and that both of you have been poisoned, too!"
"You're a good person, Chuck, and I respect that," Casey replied. "But I've got a job to do. So take it before I shove it down your throat!"
"OK, OK, fine. I'll do it." Sarah breathed a sigh of relief. "I'll pretend to agree to take it then run like hell to my sister's room and make her take it. Why did I just say that out loud?"
"It's the poison; it makes you tell the truth," Sarah replied.
Casey leveled his gun at Chuck. "You do that, I'll give chase, put a gun to your head, and threaten to pull the trigger if you don't take it."
"Would you really shoot me?" Chuck asked.
"No," Casey said, upset the serum called his bluff.
"Yeah, don't waste the bullet. We're already dead! I'm going to save my sister."
Chuck ran down the hallway to Ellie's room and carefully fed her the antidote. Sarah and Casey watched from the window outside. Sarah found it hard to believe they ever considered Chuck to be the enemy. Chuck had more heart than all of the assets she had ever encountered put together. And she never met anybody who cared for others as much as he did. It didn't matter to him how important he was to the safety of the country. The thought never even crossed his mind. He wouldn't let his sister die, no matter what the circumstances. And he was more worried about Casey and her than he was about himself, even though all three of them were condemned to death by Payne. Sarah knew that Casey, Carina, and Jimmy would not have given a second thought to giving up their lives for her, and she felt the same way about each of them. But Chuck was the exact same way and he didn't even know her a month ago. She was another actress in Hollywood as far as he was concerned. Her instincts that first day were right: there was something special about Chuck. She just didn't realize how special it was.
Chuck exited Ellie's room. "I am so sorry about all of this," Sarah told him.
"It's OK. Hey, it's not all bad," Chuck replied. "At least I don't have to work out my five-year plan again. Streamlined that down to about five hours."
"Nobody's dying today," Casey said, still resolute despite a weakened voice. "We're gonna get those codes and the antidote."
"But how?"
They turned at the sound of someone clearing their throat. Jimmy was behind them waving Payne's tracking device with a raised eyebrow.
"I think we have the answer," Sarah said with a smile.
Los Angeles, CA
October 16, 2015
12:30 AM PDT
Chuck, Sarah, and Casey arrived at Payne's apartment complex, having traced the signal from the bug Payne took with him from the hospital. Sarah worked on picking the lock.
"Wait, who is better at this?" Chuck asked quickly.
"I am," Sarah replied.
"She is," Casey admitted. "Damn truth serum."
Sarah got the door open, and the three of them ran to the elevator to get to the penthouse level.
"God, you're so pretty," Chuck said, looking at Sarah. He then turned to Casey. "Casey, your jaw was chiseled by Michelangelo himself."
Casey gave him a weird look. "Thank you."
The elevator arrived, and the three took it to the top floor. Sarah carefully knocked on the door.
"Yes? Who is it?" Payne called out.
"The NSA, CIA, and me, who's a little tougher to explain, but…" Chuck replied.
Sarah shushed him as Casey shot the door lock, taking Chuck and Sarah by surprise. "We all have our skill set," he said with a shrug.
Casey kicked the door in and Sarah and he went in with guns drawn. Payne held his hands up as he walked slowly down the stairs.
"Well, this feels like a scene from the TV show," Payne said calmly. "But I have to believe you know by now the bad guy can win in real life if they know what they're doing. Which I do."
"Casey would rather shoot you in the face than let you get away," Sarah said.
Casey turned to her. "That's the nicest thing you've ever said about me."
He turned back to Payne. "Where are the codes, you son of a bitch?"
"And where's the antidote?" Sarah added.
Payne smiled. "Well, since I was about to have some myself and would hate to see the show get cancelled, it's only fair I share the antidote with you."
Payne walked over to a table filled with vials. He grabbed four of them and held them out for Chuck, Sarah, and Casey to take.
"Careful there," Casey warned. "I haven't killed anybody for real in a long time and I'm getting hungry."
Payne tipped his vial at the three, and they raised their vials to their lips.
"No, no, no! Wait, wait, wait! Don't, don't, don't!" Chuck shouted in alarm.
"What, did you have a flash?" Sarah asked.
"No, I've just read tons of comic books. And the villain always samples it first."
Sarah and Casey realized Chuck was right and tried to hand their vials back to Payne. Payne leaped forward and knocked Casey's gun out of his hands. He then sent a spinning kick at Sarah to knock her gun down. He backflipped across the penthouse and ended up by the large panoramic windows at the one end.
A loud crash was heard by everyone. Payne turned to see Carina come through the window on a rope and harness. She nailed him with a vertical kick. He staggered back to get away from her and turned…right into Jimmy, who sent a wicked spinning kick to his head that lifted him off the ground. He spun through the air and landed hard on the wooden floor, completely knocked out.
"Flip that, bitch," Jimmy spat at him while training his guns on Payne.
Los Angeles, CA
October 16, 2015
1:00 AM PDT
Chuck and Sarah watched quietly as Casey, Carina, Jimmy, and the NSA finished the clean-up and arrest of Riordan Payne. Still under the influence of the truth serum, Payne told them where the antidote and nuclear codes were. They had to be patient, as Payne had only woken up a few minutes ago from Jimmy's vicious kick.
"How come Carina and Jimmy didn't tell us about their plans?" Chuck asked.
"I'd assume they were afraid we'd give them away under the influence of the truth serum," Sarah replied. "At least I hope that was the reason. Otherwise, we're having a long talk in the morning."
"I'm just glad they're on our side."
Sarah nodded. "I agree. I've seen Carina get more vicious than most of the bad guys I've ever encountered. And Jimmy can go from zero to completely insane in two seconds."
An NSA operative walked up to them with two vials of the antidote. Sarah prepared to drink hers.
"Wait a minute," Chuck said.
"What's the matter?" Sarah asked.
"It's just…this will probably be the last chance that I have to know the truth. I…I know you're just doing your job here, but sometimes it feels so real, you know? So, tell me. You and me. Us. Our thing under the undercover thing. Is this ever going anywhere?"
Sarah stared at him. She saw that look again. She knew what he wanted her answer to be, and she would give anything to tell him that. But the events of the past several days proved beyond a doubt she had to put her feelings away in order to keep Chuck alive. As much as she could rely on her team, both as partners and friends, she knew she had to do what was right for the safety of the country.
She looked down at the ground. "I'm sorry, Chuck. No."
She saw his reaction and it hurt her to no end. To make it worse, he was doing whatever it took to put the brakes on his emotions and lock them away. It was painful to witness, particularly from him. She was used to it because of how she grew up, but he didn't deserve this.
"Got it," he said. "Got it. Thank you for being honest. Even though I guess you don't really have a choice in the matter."
Both of them drank the antidote.
Echo Park – Los Angeles, CA
October 16, 2015
7:15 PM PDT
Chuck walked down the hallway and took a peek into Ellie and Awesome's room. Apparently some of the things Ellie told Sarah and Jimmy while under the influence of the truth serum made their way to Devon. The shorts she hated were thrown out, and Devon surprised her with a little heart locket when they got home from the hospital. He gave a little smile. It was so hard to believe less than 24 hours ago, she was fighting for her life. Chuck did what he had to do to save her, and neither Ellie nor Awesome were any the wiser for what happened. But they were happy, and that's what Chuck hoped for.
He went to his room, where Flemming's CD sat on his computer desk. It was the one thing that had gone through his mind since yesterday, apart from Sarah telling him their relationship could only ever be a cover. He wanted to know why Flemming had a file on him but was afraid of what he might find out. He still couldn't understand why Flemming had him kicked out of Stanford nor could he understand Bryce's betrayal.
The truth can't hurt much worse than it hurts now, Chuck thought to himself.
He put the CD in the drive and scrolled down to his name under the year 2003.
"You're not supposed to be looking at that, Chuck."
Chuck turned in surprise to see Sarah outside of his window. She climbed through the famed 'Morgan entrance' and sat down on Chuck's bed. "That information is top secret."
"I…I have to know, Sarah. I have to know what happened. Why I was in the Intersect and why Bryce betrayed me."
Sarah looked down at the ground. What she was letting Chuck do broke every rule in the book. But after the events of the past several days, she was getting the feeling she needed to know what was on that disc as much as Chuck did.
"OK, Chuck."
Chuck clicked on the file for him. He saw a video showing Flemming in his office talking to the camera.
"Test Subject 0326, Bartowski. This will be his first interview."
Flemming called his secretary to let Chuck come into the office. Bryce entered instead.
"Bryce…this isn't a good time. I'm waiting for another student."
"Chuck Bartowski? He never got your message."
"What are you talking about?"
"You put Chuck on the CIA recruitment track."
"It's not up to me, Bryce. They want him for the Omaha Project."
Bryce stared in shock. "But that's a military operation. They'll turn Chuck into…"
"I'm required to send all the top test results to the agency."
"I want my friend out of this."
"He's a perfect candidate. Keywords in his essay responses correlate to 98% of the subliminal images in the exam."
"You don't get it. Chuck's a good person. He's got too much heart for this kind of work. He's no operative."
Sarah remained silent behind Chuck but could feel her emotions boiling to the surface once again. Bryce could not have been more right about Chuck.
"You can't put him out in the field! He won't survive!"
Flemming shook his head. "The agency is not going to let go of a recruit this promising. The amount of information he can retain? The last recruit I heard of that did this well was almost 15 years ago."
"And he committed suicide." Bryce was livid the organization he joined could be this cruel. "They're not gonna give him a choice?"
"He's in, no matter what."
Bryce sat back in the chair and thought for a moment. He had one solution, which was a lesser evil than letting Chuck be taken by the government. But not much less.
"If he cheated on the exam, copied all the answers, then it would invalidate the results, wouldn't it?"
"Yes."
"Good. Now you're going to help me, Professor."
Bryce got up from the chair and the interview shut itself off.
Chuck sat back in his chair in complete shock. "Bryce framed me for cheating…to save me? Why didn't he just tell me that to begin with?"
Sarah tried to rein in what she was feeling at that moment, having accepted for the first time she may not have been responsible for driving Bryce away. "He couldn't. They had already recruited him."
"Well, if he had good reason for getting me kicked out, maybe had a good reason to break into the Intersect, too."
Sarah nodded. "Maybe he had a good reason for sending it to you."
Chuck exhaled slowly. "Just wish I could talk to him. It must have tore hin up to not be able to tell me."
Sarah ejected the CD from Chuck's computer. "No one can know about this. For your own safety, OK?"
"Sure," Chuck replied with a significant amount of dejection. "No one would believe me anyway."
Sarah sat down on the bed. She was about to make a bad day even worse, and there was nothing she could do about it. This had been a bad week for everyone, especially Chuck. But she had to do this.
"Chuck, there's one other thing. I'm going to put Jimmy in charge as your primary handler instead of me."
He turned to her a bit wide-eyed. "What, did I do something wrong? If this was about last night…"
"No, it has nothing to do with last night," she replied, which was an out-and-out lie. Fortunately, she was ready for this. "I should have done this from the beginning. You always organize yourself on your team's strengths. Jimmy used to be an Intersect himself. He's our computer expert, he knows what you have to go through more than the rest of us put together. And he's easily one of the best listeners I've ever encountered. He'll do a good job, I promise."
"No, I don't question what he can do. It's just…I'm…"
"It's best for you and for the project," Sarah quickly said. She took the CD and went to the window. "I'll see you later, Chuck."
Chuck watched her exit the apartment and leaned back in his chair. He thought it quite the irony that he now knew why he was kicked out of Stanford yet felt even emptier than that day he left his fraternity for the train ride home.
Outside, Sarah walked over to where Jimmy was waiting for her.
"Did you tell him?" he asked.
She nodded gently. "You're in charge of him now. Do a good job."
"That I promise. I'll bet you're glad you weren't on the truth serum anymore. That would have made the conversation a lot more awkward."
Sarah shook her head. "It wouldn't have mattered. I was trained to resist the effects of Pentothal."
Jimmy looked at her a moment. "Are you OK, kiddo?"
Sarah hung her head. "Bryce got Chuck kicked out of Stanford to keep him from being recruited into Project Omaha."
Jimmy exhaled slowly. "Wow. Good call on his part. I heard of that project while I was still in the holding facility. They almost put me on it. Everybody in that op ended up dead or in a psych ward."
"I just wish…I just wish I knew why Bryce left. Why he couldn't face me."
"I…don't really have an answer. But I know it wasn't because of you. It never was. You don't walk away from someone like Sarah Walker unless you have a damn good reason to do it."
"And yet I just did that to Chuck. He didn't deserve what I just did. He doesn't deserve to have to go through this."
"You did what you had to do to protect him, what Agent Walker should have done. Unfortunately, what's right for Agent Walker to do isn't what's right for Sarah. And that's a person who deserves all the good fortune that she can get."
Sarah tried to muster a smile but couldn't bring herself to do it. Between finding out about what Bryce did and having to pull herself away from Chuck, her emotions were ready to spill over.
"Is the teddy bear available?" she said softly.
"Always," Jimmy replied with a warm smile.
Sarah gave a little laugh as Jimmy put his arms around her. She rested her head on his shoulder as a few tears rolled down her cheeks.
