Chuck had not gotten around to setting his alarm before stumbling back to his room and more or less collapsing on to his bed, Not even bothering to change his clothes. wearing the same clothes he wore at the club last night. The light from the sun steamed in through small window covered by a set of blinds that only did a half assed job at actually keeping the beams of blinding luminescence from getting through. His eyes flickered open briefly before closing on their own. His head was aching and his tongue felt dry like a sand paper. Is this what morning after usually feels like? His unfocused mind wondered . The thought of previous night brought a smile to his face. It had been a while since he had done something crazy like that and he really enjoyed it.
"Why it must be Tuesday!" Chuck muttered with a yawn. Dusting his hands of, He laid back in his bed, not wanting to get up at all.
Damn that sun! Couldn't it have picked up a better time to rise? Or better yet, not risen at all? One of these days he was going to find some way to turn it off! They always seemed to come at the worst times. This one definitely did. Grunting slightly he slowly sat up in his bed.
As the brown haired youth began to gain cognitive thoughts, he stretched himself out and jumped out from his bed. Slowly but surely, Chuck Bartowski got up and made his way towards the bathroom, albeit with a stumbling gait.
"Another day, Another dollar." Chuck sighed. It was just another day of his new life and not much has changed. Indeed, he isn't living the high life he wanted to before getting in the Stanford. He didn't get along with 80% of his colleagues. His seniors were becoming unbearable as they didn't know half the stuff they were talking about. Chuck often corrected their mistakes at times, which in the process, made him land on top of his boss' shitlist. Unfortunately, for obvious reasons only known to a select few, he was basically unfireable. Which frustrated a certain number of people in position of authority to no end. Which made him feel...lonely and vulnerable in many ways.
He came long way from what he was after getting expelled from Stanford but the progress was still incomplete. In this rat race called his life, he got stuck halfway through and he didn't know what else he could do next to move forward. Privately Chuck knew that there were a lot of unresolved issues in his life. Things that got in his way of leading an effective social life like everyone else around him did. His only solution had been so far to keep up with his training and become stronger, both mentally and physically. While it allowed him endure but that didn't completely fix what was wrong. That's why there were times he just preferred being a pariah and work alone. His personal life was definitely a hot mess. Especially with Lou gone. He was not hung up on her as much as he should have been otherwise but he definitely missed having a companion around, someone whom he could open up to in regards of his problems, at least a little. But with her gone, he felt kind of lost and distracted
Suddenly the picture of parents, stationed on the top of his drawers grabbed his attention. Absently Chuck closed his eyes, taking a deep calming breath, he focused for a moment, looking both inward and outward, his eyes staring intently on the image of his mother and father while his mind, body and soul searched for something.
Something he had been dearly hoping to find out ever since he opened that god damned case!
Answers about the sudden disappearance of his parents.
After a second or two, he sighed.
"Still nothing..."
There was not even a hint of what he had been looking for, Man, Talk about depressing!
"It " must have some information about them. I just need to find the right trigger.
He shook his head and slapped himself on the cheeks to get out of this minor funk. It would be best to not dwell on it. There was always tomorrow right? Right.
The shower began to steam and Chuck stepped in, Whether he liked or not, he still had a long day ahead of him which also included having dinner with a very beautiful and sophisticated woman, who was from Harvard , worked as a special consultant for FINCEN and owned a bloody damn Porsche. In addition to deal with troubles at office, he also needed to make sure to not to make a fool out of himself in front of her. Sarah didn't seem like judgmental type, that much he could tell. However, he still wanted to at least live up to her standards. And the fact that he had no idea about the first thing he was going to do in the evening didn't help much in that regards.
Despite all his misgivings about that though, Chuck was happy. Today was going to be a good day, he could feel it.
...xxxxxxxx...xxxxxxx...xxxxxxx...
Chuck yawned, laying his head down on the top of his table, completely tuning out his current assignment. Which involved assessing, evaluating and extract elevation data from stereo imagery. He also had to submit long and detailed reviews for the products produced by contractors and co-producers, alongside many others who were tasked to do the same. It wasn't like his opinions were going to make that much difference, they were only trying to get the general consensus from the analysts in order to ensure that final products can be generated to meet customer's stringent accuracy requirements. He found some of the Motion Imagery Processing and Exploitery softwares interesting though. But rest of the survey seemed quite tedious and boring.
Just type the first words which came to his mind. Which wasn't a big problem for him. Considering the fact that he was only dealing with some pretty basic stuff, he didn't need to think thoroughly about any of those . He wore his usual careless expression as he moved from one slide to another.
And he wasn't the only one. Most of his colleagues groaned alongside him as well. Including his neighbour, Deepak Manoosh, who stifled a yawn before leaning back in his chair, giving him a look, "Tired?"
"Was it that obvious?" Chuck sighed, once again trying and failing to bite back a yawn.
Deepak raised an eyebrow, adding with a mischievous smile "You look like you are about to pass out at any moment. I even saw your eyes dim out for a few seconds. It seems you really went all out last night. With a smoking hot bombshell nonetheless. I gotta admit Chuck, You are a fast learner"
"Nah, She is just...a friend, someone I met at Harvard. Sarah Walker . I think I told you about her once."
Deepak blinked in confusion before recalling their entire conversation from the last month. He spoke out once again, his voice filled with confusion and disbelief. To be honest, he was stupefied at how and why a straight male in that position wouldn't jump at the chance to make love to her
"Huh!, You gotta be kidding me. That was the girl who invited you at her apartment for..."
"Yep and she works for FININT. At a much senior position and she drives a porsche." Chuck shrugged, "We stayed at the club till 3 AM and I asked her out on a...
"Date?"
"No. A dinner between friends. She just wanted to catch up and know what I have been up to since last five years. She actually suggested we head over to her apartment but I was sleepy...I had to think about the office and I was kind of drunk...a little...and ..it would have been super awkward a so I pitched in with the idea."
"So it means that you like her " Deepak cried out, half pushing himself up from his chair.
Chuck scowled in an effort to hide his blush. He reached over and swatted his Indian colleague over the back of his head, eliciting a yelp of surprise, "It's not anything like that. She is smart, sensible and smokin hot ...she is out of all of our leagues, everyone in this office combined. Besides, not too long ago, she had a very nasty break up. I think dating is the last thing on her mind right now. And if having a dinner with someone means that I like them, by that logic I should be head over heels for you." Chuck tried to counter.
"I didn't know you thought about me that way Bartowski." Deepak gasped, laying a hand on his chest with a dramatic sigh, "I appreciate the thought and you are totally my type. However I am attracted to women you see. But don't worry, We will always be friends."
Chuck stared at him with half lidded eyes, "You done yet, Drama queen?"
"Yeah, pretty much." Deepak said, dropping the act, " No one is out of anyone's league. Bartowski, they are just looking for something different. Hack, some of them don't even know what they are looking for."
"That sounded almost deep. Are you really Manoosh?" Chuck asked doubtfully, looking fascinated, as an artist would when beholden to his muse, picking up his ballpen and poking lightly at the former MIT grad's thighs, "An imposter may be?" He added jokingly
"Hey, What's that supposed to mean? " Deepak responded in a mock hurt tone
However before both of them could continue with their banter, the front door to the office swung open and everything came to a sudden stop. Every analyst and IT support staff pummeling their keyboards looked up to the odd person who had decided to invade their sacred territory. It was quite obvious he stood out from everyone else.
Whether it was his brown marine service uniform, the perpetual scowl on his face which promised nothing but ill intent and last but not the least, he was built like a gorilla, he packed on lots and lots of solid muscle.
Everyone was dead silent, with rapt attention being paid to him.
Chuck didn't even know he'd been shrinking down lower in his cubicle until he realized that he couldn't anymore. Perhaps it was time to make himself scarce?
When a scary guy with an angry look on his face which could even put fear in the heart of serial killers crashed the party, It was time to leave.
"Which one of you morons is called Bartowski?"
Every eye in the office turned Chuck's way as if he was some giant neon sign that had just turned on. It wasn't quite as damning as the throwing of Christians to the lions, but the lanky analyst felt there was some sort of credence to that kind of thinking.
Gathering all of his courage, Chuck stood up from his sitting position and walked towards the scary guy who seemed like he was ready to shoot him in the face at any passing moment, "I am Charles Bartowski. GEOINT Analyst and Computer Scientist. Is there anything I can do for you Mister...?"
Chuck spoke out, extending his hand with some visible efforts on his part.
"John Casey, Special Agent, NSA." The man introduced himself with a grunt, not even bothering to shake his hand , let alone looking at it. He continued further with a frown, "Admiral Kernan told my boss that you are a golden boy, top of the line recruit. Prove it. You have a presentation at Ft Meade in next two hours and I am ordered to bring you in."
Casey shoved a file into Chuck's hands. The rookie analyst looked down at the green folder in his hands then back up at Casey.
"Don't I need a prior notice ... before taking part in something like that?" Chuck asked, still a bit shaken by the chaotic appearance of this scary man.
Casey smirked, "You really are a golden boy, huh? NSA is offering you an opportunity to prove yourself and you are trying to turn us down."
Chuck continued in a defiant tone, " The protocol requires...
"Nothing. Moron. We require nothing. We don't have the time to slow down and do everything by the book. I need you downstairs in next five minutes" Casey stated in a dead serious tone, he marched off before Chuck could even respond, leaving the young man to bumble his way to an open desk.
Now he had no doubts about that.
Today was going to suck, he just knew it.
