Chuck v. The Burning Man
Special thanks to Aardvark7734 – the best beta reader and top-secret reconnaissance gatherer in the Chuck universe!
[A/N: This chapter assumes that Chuck v. Best Friend followed Chuck v. 3-D as these episodes were originally scheduled].
Chapter 9— Spelling H-E-A-T
1/21/09 5:00 p.m.
While finishing off the final touches of his Willy Wonka chocolate bar, he wobbled into the Buy More. He thought about the ramifications of what he had experienced that day at the Happy Heights Senior Center. He couldn't believe it. WWCD? What Would Chuck Do? Where did Chuck go on his off-site installs? He knew. He knew something that all the other green shirts wanted to know. Even Chuck's BFF didn't know, he grinned from ear-to-ear with a chocolate-coated smile. He knew what Chuck did.
This was going to be better than when he made out with that pink-laced drunk girl from Benny's the night that they had the kegger at the store. That was a girl wasn't it? He was more than a little 'dazed and confused' about what happened. But it didn't really matter, he was really 'gettin' there' in the home theater room that night! At least he was until Lester came by and stopped all their McLovin.
Head prefect of all things BuyMoria--Emmitt Milbarge--would pay dearly for this knowledge. Only he wasn't a sell-out like that nerd herder Skip Johnson. The last thing he wanted was his picture up on the wall next to Buy More CEO Moses Finklestein. He had his own standards and his own motivations. He was Jeffster's #1 fan (and not terribly unlike the Kathy Bates in Misery way). And with this information, Fernando Delgado knew that he would get a front-row pass at their next gig. He might even score a t-shirt.
The one whose name began his favorite band was sitting at the nerd herd technical support desk. Fernando was clearly nervous, but this green shirt knew that this was his chance to score points with a man who was both an arcade legend and a musical genius. As Fernando neared the desk, he saw the Buy More marvel put a pen down after he finished cleaning his ear with it. Not a person of many words – in fact, not a person of any words - Fernando Delgado picked up Jeff's ear utensil and scribbled, I know WWCD. Suddenly, the flushed green-shirt had his 'much cooler' mentor's attention.
Jeff stared wide-eyed back at the silent 'Other' (as Emmitt often called him) and his mouth watered in anticipation. Jeff mouthed, "You know where Chuck goes?"
Fernando nodded as beads of sweat began to form on his upper lip.
After years as Missile Command World Champion, Jeff knew a devoted fan-boy when he saw one. "If you tell me," Jeff paused and continued, "I'll let you sit in on one of our jams and you can even meet my ferret Roscoe."
Fernando gleefully squealed like a pig which clearly took the cooler nerd Jeff aback for a moment. Could Jeff really hang with this 'person' for the sake for the sake of learning Chuck's secret? This green shirt was such a geek. But for the sake of national security, BuyMoria security that was, Jeff knew it was time to take one for the team. He motioned for the green shirt to continue.
Fernando leaned toward Jeff and whispered something into his ear. Jeff ran his fingers through his thinning hair and scrunched his eyes brows. He wasn't sure he heard him right and so Jeff asked, "Scrabble?"
Four hours earlier . . . (give or take a few minutes)
"Scrabble?" Chuck questioned in disbelief.
"You want me to skip the rest of my shift at the Buy More to go play Scrabble?" He added with inflection the second time.
"What's wrong Bartowski, can't leave the shenanigans of the Buy More behind?" the green-shirted NSA Agent responded.
"No, I mean Yes. For the sake of national security, fine," Chuck looked at both of his handlers. He turned his palms up and questioned, "But for Scrabble? Besides I'm no wordsmith. Puzzles fine. Jenga I'm there. But letters on a rack?"
"Alright Chuck, have it your way," the Major manipulator looked over at Agent Walker and winked. "We appreciate you expressing your concern for the success of the mission by identifying your own shortcomings to us."
Chuck nodded. He knew a backhanded compliment when he heard one, but he thought that perhaps he was finally getting somewhere with Casey. Maybe Chuck was finally going to get to make some decisions with respect to their missions.
"Agent Walker, you're the Harvard grad, why don't we enter you in the contest?" Casey slyly offered waiting for Bartowski to take the bait.
In typical fashion, the nerd latched right on to the lure--hook, line, and sinker.
"Wuh? Harvard?" Chuck stared at Sarah for a brief moment in disbelief.
Agent Walker scrunched her brows and scowled at the NSA agent, "Thanks a lot, Casey." It was readily apparent from the shift in her stance that she was uncomfortable with Casey delving into her past for the sole purpose of drawing Chuck in. She really didn't want to manipulate Chuck. Instead, she would have much rather been honest with him about the reason that she would not fit in at the Scrabble tournament. Unfortunately, she knew that Casey's pretense would make Chuck think that he was making his own decisions.
"What you didn't know that your main squeeze was a brain tease?" Casey quipped.
"You went to Harvard?" Chuck focused on Sarah as his expression changed to admiration mixed with the typical Bartowski sly 'I know something else about Sarah Walker' look.
"Where do you think she learned all of those languages you moron—Rosetta Stone?" the Major was clearly on a roll.
Chuck took his focus off of Sarah and coolly responded directly to Casey. "I don't know. I guess I never really thought about it."
The stoic girl across from him remained eerily quiet – so much so that Chuck knew that he had just discovered another piece in the puzzle that was Sarah Walker. There was still so much that he didn't know about the beautiful, blonde and smart agent. He really wanted to follow up--to ask more questions and fill-in more detail--but he knew from her blank expression that now was not that time. Those remaining pieces would have to wait.
Casey smiled. It was now time to reel Chuck in and back to the task at hand.
"Here, take a look at the participants in the tournament and see if you flash on any of them." Casey smiled and winked again at Agent Walker.
Chuck looked down at the photographs of the tournament entrants. Glancing from one to the next, his brow became furrowed and his eyes narrowed. "Mmm… Uh… Oh…" he remarked as he perused each face. This was quite a collection of… eccentrics. They kind of reminded him of the people who came to the Buy More for Jeff's Missile Command event a few months ago. Whoa – a mullet? Chuck expected vacant eyes and a slack expression from this Laslo Hollyfeld, yet a more careful inspection of the man's face revealed… a 'real genius'? He scanned through the rest: Eugene "The Plague" Belford and Ben "Number 5 Is Alive" Janituya (who appeared to be identical twins); Pat Riley (whose gender was not readily discernable); Steve Urkel (in oversize glasses and suspenders); Arnold Poindexter (with electric shock hair over a three piece suit) and finally Maury Cheeks.
Chuck shook his head slowly and allowed himself a small smirk. Maury Cheeks, in his "Five for Fighting" airbrushed concert tee and incredible comb-over hairdo. It was this guy that finally clued him in as to what crowd they were dealing with here. These were not even Jeff's people – these were Emmitt Milbarge's people.
Chuck had heard about and occasionally caught glimpses of these echelons of nerdom but he had never experienced them. He was unsure if even he could pass for one of the trolls in this crowd. But he was certain that the beautiful CIA Agent, even if she was Harvard educated, would have no chance at all.
"Okay, Casey we can't let Sarah go in there. She would stick out like a sore thumb," Chuck sighed.
Casey nodded. Manipulation complete.
"Yeah, we're gonna need someone who can look the part," Agent Walker paused and gave her partner a cold condescending 'wouldn't it have been easier to just tell in the truth' look.
"Don't look at me," the confident Major picked up his Desert Eagle pistol and put a round in the chamber which made the distinctive 'CHINCK CHINCK' noise. "The only game I play involves this little toy right here," he responded with a gleam in his eye.
"Well, I'm sure that that would be real helpful in this crowd, Officer Tackleberry," Chuck muttered as he pointed to the much more nerdy people in the photographs on the table.
"Look, Chuck don't worry, I'll get you through it," Sarah said as she placed her hand reassuringly on top of his. He looked down at her hand and back at her face and warmly smiled. Realizing her slip, Agent Walker withdrew but not before John Casey noticed the gesture and grunted.
"Can we get back to the mission Joanie and Chachi?" the Major quipped.
Chuck raised the side of his lip and gave a silent snarl.
Agent Walker refocused on the paperwork in front of her as if nothing had happened. "While we were gathering intelligence in Glendale, we found something definitely odd was going on at the Center."
Chuck sensed a chance to get back at the Major 'pain in his behind.' "Wait, you had an undercover recon at the Happy Heights Senior Center? Lemme guess Casey--shuffleboard and checkers, riding around in a motorized scooter, posing as the lady in a Snuggie who'd fallen down and couldn't get up?" Chuck smirked.
"Bartowski! If you don't shut your trap, I'm gonna tell every in this room about what's fallen down and can't get up." Casey pointed down at the 'produce' section of the other male in the room.
"Wha…?" Chuck pouted for a second as he looked down at the lower half of his body, but quickly recovered, sort of. "See, I knew I could bring the old Casey back out, I was beginning to miss the degrading quips about my manhood."
"Can we focus on the mission you two?" Agent Walker cut in and continued in an effort to get them back on track and also to forget the slip in her own resolve a few moments before.
"Alright, from the NSA intercepted phone calls which originated from the Senior Center, we determined that these calls all occur on the same day each week at the same time of day," Casey explained with renewed focus.
"Chuck, the only events that are regularly scheduled at that time are these Scrabble tournaments," Agent Walker responded.
"Our intelligence suggests that someone is forging our satellite links to Creech Air Force base and that our squadrons of MQ-1 Predators and MQ-9 Reapers have been affected as a result," the Major responded.
"Affected, what do you mean affected?" Chuck questioned as he looked at Sarah.
"So far whoever is doing this have not been successful," she began.
Casey interjected, "But whoever tried to take control of the squadron's operations center didn't have the correct encryption keys for the telemetry before."
Chuck looked at the Major, "What about now?"
"Well, if these terrorists try this again, and they have the right keys, there will be no stopping them from launching multiple surprise attacks with the Hellfire missiles attached to these birds from anywhere they are stationed in the world," the Major responded with a grave tone.
Chuck gulped.
"What we don't know is who 'they' are, how the keys are being leaked, and how they are disseminating them. And so, that's what we need to determine on this mission," Agent Walker responded.
"As part of our on-site reconnaissance, I posed as a cable guy. While I was there I saw a company—Barak Mobility—installing some heavy duty hard lines as well as some military-grade surveillance equipment inside the Center. It appeared that some of the hard technology was manufactured by Roark Instruments," Major Casey stated.
"You're kidding?" Chuck said as he rolled his eyes and leaned back into his chair.
"Why, did you flash?" Sarah asked with some concern.
"Huh? . . . no." Chuck shook his head. He refocused and continued, "That was just the company my dad used to work for more than a decade ago."
"Well, it appears that the Center has broken ground on a new expansion and they are using some of Roark's technology to update the security at the facility. There are quite a few contractors on-site so keeping an eye out for any unsavory types won't be as simple as we previously thought," Casey paused and cleared his throat before he continued, "but Agent Walker thought that the Intersect could help narrow down our target." The Major still couldn't bring himself to openly admit that the Intersect or Bartowski could provide much-needed intelligence that his cold-school strong-arm tactics could not.
Agent Walker half smiled at Casey in recognition and then turned to the other member of their team. "Chuck, do you know anything about Lateral Energies? They are listed on the electrical permits?"
"No, I got nothing."
"How about Holloway Corporation? They are listed as the general contractors," she continued.
"No, nothing. Sorry."
"As usual Bartowski, thank you for completely wasting my time," the Major retorted as they made their way out of the castle.
Chuck shrugged at him and followed him up the metal staircase. He had no way of knowing that in a matter of weeks he'd be all too familiar with these innocuous sounding companies – each a fully functioning shell corporation of Fulcrum.
There was no time to waste. Fernando Delgado wobbled into the Happy Heights Senior Center just in the nick of time. It was only 45 minutes before the kick-off of the Scrabble tournament. He had to make sure that his sibling 'Pat' was primed and ready for the big match. With any luck, Pat would make the semi-finals which would guarantee a trip to the National Scrabble Championships in Reno, Nevada later that spring.
Fernando brought all the essentials--Jolt cola, Pop Rocks, Mylanta, and wet wipes, along with Pat's cassette mix tape and walkman. As he neared his sibling, Fernando noticed that Pat was reading the bible--the OSPD ("Official Scrabble Players Dictionary"). Although only half-siblings, Pat and Fernando were strikingly similar—both were rotund with short, curly hair and glasses. Since it was his day off, Fernando also wore a blue western-style shirt with tan slacks to match Pat. As Fernando neared with the supplies, Pat nasally squeaked, "Ewww!" in recognition.
Fernando put the mix tape in the walkman, pushed 'play' and handed it to Pat. As Pat put on the earphones, Joe Esposito's song You're the Best Around cued. Pat grabbed the Pop Rocks and washed them down with the Jolt Cola. Pat's stomach rumbled in protest which prompted Pat to take a large gulp of Mylanta. These 'necessary' steps were all part of the pre-match routine that they had developed long ago in preparation for this moment. In anticipation, Pat's palms, face, and neck began to sweat profusely. Fernando grabbed the wet wipes and toweled off Pat's hot neck and forehead. He could just hear the words from Pat's earphones:
. . . . . . . . . . You're the Best around nothing's ever gonna keep you down
. . . . . . . . . . You're the Best around nothing's ever gonna keep you down
Fernando knew that Pat was the best semi-pro scrabble player around. In this nerd's eyes, nothing was going to keep his sibling down.
Team Bartowski arrived at the Happy Heights Senior Center approximately 20 minutes prior to the start of the tournament. Although the ancient crowd suspiciously eyeing them outside had not changed, there was definitely a lot of new activity going on adjacent to the west of the building. As they drove by the entrance they noticed a new sign:
Happy Heights Senior Center
Invites you to join the best new place around:
Meadow Brook Retirement Village
Opening May 2009
-----------
Financing made possible through Teveron Consulting
General Contractor—Holloway Corporation
"Hey Casey, looks like we've found a place for you to retire when the NSA finally springs for an upgrade," Chuck said gesturing to the sign as he got out of the van.
"Can it Bartowski, you remember what happened last time we were here," Casey coolly pointed to the Dobermans sitting by the same old man sleeping in a rocking chair. From the look of the guy and his academy ring, Casey deduced he was retired navy. Casey looked down at his own service ring in recognition. Of course, Chuck didn't notice this as he was too busy yammering into his watch.
"Yeah, Sarah did he tell you how I totally saved the mighty Casey from getting a literal ass-chewing?" Chuck joked into his watch.
She smiled in the van as she listened to their banter. She knew better than to get in the middle of that conversation.
"Stop your lip smacking, we don't want to stir them up again," Casey said as they neared the door.
Almost as if there was an instant replay of a scene from weeks ago, the dogs rose to attention. As before, Chuck wasn't paying any attention to the dogs.
"Hell-O, you forgot about my . . . whistles" Chuck whistled as he shook his iPhone in jest.
The Dobermans interpreted Chuck's gesture as a call to duty and started toward them.
"Great, not again. Gimme that," Casey grabbed Chuck's iPhone, punched the , and pointed it at the hounds. The dogs scurried back to their master. But before they moved on into the Center, Casey used Chuck's iPhone to take a picture of the sleeping gentleman and made a quick close up on retired serviceman's ring. He always made it a practice to honor those in some way who had served before him.
Chuck looked back at Casey as if to wonder what the hold up was. Casey snapped out of it and snickered.
"What is it with you and dogs, Bartowski?"
Inside the Center, what might be described as a 'dog' of a person was finishing up the 'Pat Riley' pre-match ritual. Pat had already registered and waiting to attack. Pat's first prey was Laslo Hollyfeld. Pat knew Laslo's reputation for being a 'real genius' due to his winning 31.8% of the 1985 Frito Lay sweepstakes prizes. Laslo had taken the 'No purchase necessary, enter as often as you want' guideline seriously when he flooded the contestant pools with millions entries. Due to his success, sweepstakes rules nationwide were changed to 'One entry per contestant' and thus, Laslo had switched to semi-pro competitive Scrabble as a way to earn some scratch.
Pat knew that the winner of this match would then play the winner of the Poindexter-Carmichael match. Pat knew Arnold Poindexter well--that 'nerd' was out for 'revenge' since the last time Pat defeated him. Pat didn't know anything about newcomer Charles Carmichael but rookies were usually easy kills and so Pat anticipated a thriller of a re-match with Poindexter in the next round.
Pat glanced at the other bracket. Eugene "The Plague" Belford was a 'hack' of a player. He was up against the robotics geek, Ben "Number Five is Alive" Jabituya. Pat always found it suspicious that neither of these scrabble vets were in the room at the same time. It was almost as if one of them was Clark Kent and the other was . . . no, Pat stopped. Neither of those creeps was Superman. For years, Pat had 'fished' for answers about that oddity almost as much as they had unsuccessfully sought answers from Pat about Pat's sexuality. "Ewww!" Pat thought. All of their 'fishing' had left each of them with nothing—even 'steven'.
The remaining opening match pitted Steve Urkel up against Maury "Sweet" Cheeks. Maury was still a relative newcomer to the semi-professional Scrabble ranks. Unlike Pat, Maury Cheeks didn't quit his day job at Roark to focus on Scrabble. He was a bit of an enigma to Pat and his tile play sometimes confused the seasoned vet. He was skittish and had a strange habit of zoning out during some of his matches. Maybe he would zone out today, the competitor in Pat thought.
With any luck, today would be Pat's day. Pat was now ready to play some tiles.
As the male members of Team Bartowski made their way to the tournament registration desk, Chuck again recognized that for once he might be 'too-cool' for this crowd. He knew if he tried to explain to Casey that there were definitely levels of nerdom and that the gamer nerds were much cooler and rarely, if ever, mixed with the board gamer geeks, he would just have to endure some disapproving grunt or another comment about his manhood. Instead, for once Chuck decided to focus on the task at hand—i.e. trying to look as though he fit in.
"Casey, I'm not dressed for this."
Casey scanned the room. Chuck's nerd herd uniform was actually the hippest thing in the room, aside from his own green-shirt and khakis. Normally, Casey would have worn full spy-gear for a mission, but in this case he had thought that their Buy More uniforms would look the part. As he finished his visual sweep of the room, he scowled and recognized that Chuck was right.
"Lose the tie," Casey responded.
Chuck took off his tie and badge. As he started to take off his other nerd herd gear, Casey stopped him.
"Keep the pocket protector, you're gonna need that to look the part."
"Here, take these, they'll be our eyes on you, they contain a camera for us to see what you are looking at," Casey handed him some horn-rimmed glasses with scotch tape wrapped around the nose bridge.
"And pull up your pants so that we can see your white socks, but not so much as to scare anyone with a Bartowski camel toe," Casey quipped.
Chuck sneered with a half-curled lip.
"Wait, hold it!" Casey pulled out Chuck's iPhone from his pocket and took a picture. The Major couldn't help but chuckle as he slid his finger across the screen and tapped 'send'.
"What did you do that for?" Chuck asked.
"Birth control."
"WAIT! Who did you send that to?" Chuck asked dreading the answer.
And he received his answer through his earwig as he heard the much prettier member of Team Bartowski begin to cough violently as if she'd swallowed something down the wrong pipe which lead Casey to let out a snort of victory.
"Great. As much fun as it is for you to make fun of 'uber-nerd Charles Carmichael,' can we just get this over with and figure out how the code is being disseminated?"
Casey smiled a satisfied half-grin as he looked up at the tournament bracket overhead. "Looks like you're up against Arnold Poindexter first, go get 'em champ," Casey said shoving Chuck toward the tourney tables with a swift pat on the back.
As Chuck made it over to his table, he heard the tournament announcer give a few opening remarks.
"Welcome to the Glendale Regional Scrabble Tournament! The top four finishers will receive automatic berths to the National Scrabble Tournament in Reno, Nevada coming up in a short few weeks," the tournament director announced.
Several ewws and ahhhs came from the crowd. Casey grunted. Under his breath he whispered 'Nerdvana' purely for Agent Walker's benefit.
"Let the tile laying begin!" the tournament director finished.
Chuck sat down and waited for his opponent. He noticed from across the room a red-headed cross-eyed guy with coke-bottle glasses in a three-piece polyester suit making his way slowly toward him but not before bumping into every other table in the room. Chuck stood up and extended his hand to guy. "Hi, I'm Chuck . . . Charles Carmichael," he remembered.
"Arnold Poindexter. Nice nerd pack, what have you got in it?" the red-headed geek asked as he pointed to Chuck's pocket protector.
"Oh, yeah, um, just a few essentials, you know, pens, pin light, Swiss-army knife, eye-glass screwdriver, electrical tape," Chuck remarked.
"What no compass?" Poindexter gruffed as if to brush off his opponent as a poser--truly an amateur nerd.
"Oh, I've got GPS in my watch . . . I mean iPhone—hey look at the time, we better get started," Chuck said as he grabbed the bag of tiles and pulled out a letter—I. Poindexter followed suit—A. Poindexter won the tile, proceeded to draw six additional tiles, and Chuck followed suit.
As Chuck turned over his tiles one by one, something unexpected happened.
. . . . . . . . . . I-W-A-N-T-Y-O. . . . . . . . . .
Chuck crossed his arms and temporarily rested his chin on his hand so that he could speak into the mike on his watch.
"Are you getting this?" he said under his breath.
Poindexter looked at him strangely.
"Oh, I was just talking to . . ." Chuck pointed to himself.
Poindexter scrunched his brows and then rolled his crossed-eyes.
Chuck reached up to his ear, took off his glasses, turned them around, and looked straight into them. The nerd in Poindexter dismissed Chuck's action as if he was checking to see if his glasses were clean.
Poindexter then put down his word to start the match:
. . . . . . . . . . U-N-R-E-A-D. . . . . . . . . .
Chuck put his glasses back on and looked at the board. He pointed to the first letter on the board and said, "I could end up with U." He sighed, "If only three words were allowed." After pausing for a moment, he muttered, "I just wonder what U are thinking?"
What was she thinking? Agent Walker sat in the van in silence as she stared at the monitor which displayed Chuck's rack of tiles.
. . . . . . . . . . I-W-A-N-T-Y-O. . . . . . . . . .
Before she could stop herself the thought popped into her head – I want you too. She swallowed hard. Through her headset she heard the object of her 'want' ask, "Are you getting this?"
All too well it seemed. Thank God he wasn't looking at her, she thought. He would be able to see straight through to her very soul. The monitor blurred due to unsteady movement. She looked down at the wires and checked the connections. Then she heard, "I was just talking to . . ." and when she looked back at the screen she saw a familiar face. It was hard to ignore the literalness of his gesture. Both his face and his overture were a little to close for comfort.
The screen blurred again and this time she knew that he was putting back on the glasses to turn his focus away from himself and back to the letters in front of him on his rack.
. . . . . . . . . . I-W-A-N-T-Y-O. . . . . . . . . .
The moment didn't shift when his competition put down his word to start the game.
. . . . . . . . . . U-N-R-E-A-D. . . . . . . . . .
She smiled weakly at the irony. Chuck couldn't see her. She had remained hidden, secretive… concealed. He hadn't been able to read her feelings for him.
She heard him continue, "I could end up with U."
The Agent wasn't thinking about the Scrabble board. Instead Sarah was deliberating over this statement in a completely different way. How could he end up with her? This was an impossible situation. They could never end up together. There was no way. She grimaced silently.
And then she heard him say, "If only three words were allowed."
Her mind raced. Three words? She knew those words from deep within. On so many levels she didn't want her feelings to be hidden, to remain a mystery, to be unknown. Unread. She had even come to terms to allow herself to let him know them in secret.
She had blatantly alluded to her feelings on New Year's Eve when she practically dared him to figure out why her favorite flowers were gardenias. Funny thing was she cared less about the flowers than the meaning behind them. Their meaning – I love you in secret. She was certain now that Chuck knew their meaning. If only three words were allowed, she sighed. Could she tell him? Could she replace the 'want' in those tiles on the rack with another vastly more important word? And what would happen if she did? The introspection stopped for a moment when she heard him speak.
"I just wonder what U are thinking?" he said.
That was the problem. U don't want to know, was her first thought. But she knew that was a lie. He was almost desperate at times in his attempts to figure out what she was thinking. But she sure didn't want to burden him with her thoughts. In a strange way, she was more ready now to tell him her feelings, but definitely not her thoughts—they would hurt him. Her thoughts led her to a place that she didn't want to go. Her thoughts betrayed her heart. Her thoughts told her that they could never happen. There was no way. She knew that if she gave completely into her feelings and to him, that she would be reassigned. And what good would that do? She wished that there was some way to reconcile her heart's desire with the logic in her mind. But she couldn't. Her thoughts and her feelings were in stark conflict with one another. It was almost as if the feelings of her inner-Sarah, the ones that she had only recently let surface, were at war with the logic and thoughts of her outward Agent Walker.
"Walker."
She heard another man's voice through her headset. Casey. It was enough to snap her out of her obviously inappropriate deliberations. They were on a mission here and the longer she let her feelings enter into her thoughts; she knew that she was not doing her job. Besides Chuck had asked not what she was feeling, but instead what she was thinking she rationalized.
Agent Walker looked at the board.
. . . . . . . . . . U-N-R-E-A-D. . . . . . . . . .
She looked at Chuck's rack.
. . . . . . . . . . I-W-A-N-T-Y-O. . . . . . . . . .
She thought back to his question, 'What are you thinking?'
She responded, "Noway"
"Huh?"
"N-O-W-A-Y," she spelled.
"Why?"
"That's right. Put the Y on the end of the word on the board. Then build your own word from there."
Agent Walker totally missed Chuck's question. She thought he meant the letter 'Y' instead of the question 'Why?' In Chuck's heart of hearts he wanted to know why there was 'no way'. The answer to his question would be apparent to him as soon as he laid down the tile. He added the Y to Poindexter's word to spell:
. . . . . . . . . . U-N-R-E-A-D-Y. . . . . . . . . .
He sighed as he looked at her answer to his question. She was unready. Then he placed his word on the board above the Y:
. . . . . . . . . . N-O-W-A-Y. . . . . . . . . .
He couldn't help but think about his own feelings at that moment. His mind and his feelings were not in conflict. He literally thought and felt that there was NO WAY that he was UNREADY.
He looked down at the remaining tiles on his rack.
. . . . . . . . . . I-T. . . . . . . . . .
He shifted the letters over and drew five more tiles and added them to his rack.
. . . . . . . . . . I-T . . . . U-N-F-A-R. . . . . . . . . .
He sighed in the realization that once again they were so close and yet so far away from one another. Chuck picked up the 'I' and placed it between the 'A' and 'R'. On Chuck's rack and in his mind all he could think about was how UNFAIR their situation was.
And if this first match was any sign of things to come, it was going to be a long day.
It had already been a long day, but Pat Riley had summarily defeated her first round opponent--Laslo Hollyfeld. Pat had literally swept the one-time sweepstakes ringer under the rug. With that win, Pat qualified for the National Scrabble Tournament in Reno. As Pat ecstatically inspected the brackets, Pat noticed that Belford, Cheeks, and the newcomer--Charles Carmichael, had all advanced to the next round, each earning berths to the national competition.
Pat wobbled over to the table where the next round was about to begin. Pat grabbed another package of Pop Rocks and sucked down the rest of the Jolt cola. Pat had sent Fernando to get some more cola but was unsure if he would be back for the next round. As Pat's next opponent neared the table, Pat couldn't help but think that he was the most beautiful thing that Pat had ever seen. Pat's heart raced, perhaps due to the combination of Jolt cola, Pop Rocks, and glowing excitement from seeing an almost normal looking man at a Scrabble tournament. Pat stood up to greet Chuck, swooned and fell straight back to the floor.
"Casey, man or ah, woman down?" Chuck dropped to the floor and checked Pat's vitals.
"She or he doesn't have a pulse," Chuck continued.
From the other side of the room, Casey looked in horror at the beached whale that Bartowski kneeled over. "Time to put all those hours of CPR to work."
"Why don't you come over and be the hero?" Chuck responded.
"No way, I've already gotten one face plant too many from you," the Major responded.
"Very funny," Chuck looked down at the swollen person. A crowd had gathered around them. The tournament director called 911 as Chuck attended to the down semi-pro Scrabble player.
Chuck tilted Pat's head back with the head-tilt chin-lift maneuver. He then used two fingers to find Pat's carotid artery and checked for a pulse while he leaned his ear over Pat's face and watched for signs of respiration. Pat still had a pulse but was not breathing. Chuck leaned down and gave Pat two full breaths. He re-checked Pat's pulse which was racing. He gave two more breaths. With the last breath, Pat came to. Pat looked up into Chuck's eyes with profound gratitude which soon gave way to a very creepy look of flushed longing.
From the other side of the room, Casey quietly spoke into his watch, "Nice work Bartowski, glad to see you're finally getting a little tonsil action."
Chuck smiled weakly as the enamored Pat continued to stare a little too thankfully.
Luckily for Chuck, the paramedics arrived quickly and insisted that Pat be escorted to the local hospital for observation. Fernando hobbled back just in time to see the shock of his sibling giving Chuck a big sweaty hug followed by an attempt to score another round of mouth-to-mouth. Chuck never saw Fernando or anyone else for that matter as he was focused on trying to get some distance from the moist drippy palms that had latched on to him. He was at least able to partially deflect the advancing Pat by turning his head only to have his ear bear the brunt of the Pat tongue assault before Pat let go. Chuck shook all over in disgust but to Pat his shaking was mistaken for shivers of joy. Even Casey was mortified by what had just happened.
"Way to take one for the team Chuck," the Major provided as he walked over to the assault victim. Casey reached down at the container of wet ones that were left by table and handed a dozen or so to Chuck. Their mutual look of disgusted shock remained firmly in place as Chuck wiped off his face, neck, and ear from the androgynous tongue lashing that he had just received.
After a few moments, and a good three dozen wet ones later, Chuck glumly looked over to Casey and asked, "Why is it they never tell you in CPR class that you might get molested by a 'shemale' once you save that person's life?"
Casey smiled and grunted. "Well, next time you make Walker breathless, maybe she'll put on the full out lip assault and make it up to you," he quipped.
"Very funny Casey. Besides, aren't you forgetting your own little 'dangerous liaison' with the Intersect?" Agent Walker responded through their earwigs.
Both Chuck and Casey looked at each other and groaned.
"We've got about 10 minutes before the final round. I've got something interesting to show both of you," Agent Walker instructed.
After making their way to the van, Agent Walker pulled up the surveillance footage from the tournament thus far.
"Chuck when you were busy saving that 'person's' life, a call was placed from the Center giving out two letters in the Predator encryption key," Agent Walker stated.
"So we know it had to have come from one of the other semi-finalists either Maury Cheeks or Eugene Belford," Casey deduced and continued, "but I've been watching both of them and I haven't detected a thing."
"Well, I did a more extensive background of both of them and it turns out that Maury Cheeks works for Roark Instruments," Agent Walker added.
"Roark again? You know I almost got a job there while I was at Stanford. I had the whole thing lined up for the summer of 2003, it was supposed to be a real dream job," Chuck said a bit pathetically.
"Well it looks like you're about to get to meet one of your 'dream' co-workers." Casey pointed to the screen as the three members of Team Bartowski noticed that Maury Cheeks had just won his match and advanced to the final round.
"Wait, a minute, there's another call going out from Center," Agent Walker interrupted and immediately started a trace on the call. She listened over the headset as she heard another set of letters being sent over the airwaves only to be abruptly disconnected.
"I guess my dream co-worker is into creating nightmares," Chuck weakly responded.
Somewhere in the middle of the Nevada wilderness
What a terrible nightmare, Steve Bartowski thought. He couldn't sleep, all he could see were planes flying overhead dropping missiles at will. To be sure, it was the middle of the afternoon, but Steve knew that he needed to be on high alert at night because that's when 'they' often came. He knew that even after all these years; they were still looking for him. Big Brother Ted Roark was always watching and waiting for him.
But this afternoon Steve had been startled not once but twice by the ringing of that pesky satellite phone that that nudey guy—Sweet Cheeks—had given him. It had been all busted up but Steve had fixed it. He had even hacked into NORAD just for old time's sake. But until recently, no one had ever called that number. He stared at the number as it rang.
. . . . . . . . . . (818) 867-5309. . . . . . . . . .
It was a Southern California extension. He knew who was calling; there was a sticker on the side of the phone which practically announced it--Roark Instruments. Amateurs, he coolly thought. Could they be more obvious?
"Ted you just never give up, do you?" he said out loud.
Steve reached over and took the battery off the back of the phone. He set the phone down, leaned back on the couch and looked back at the picture on the coffee table. A warm smile crossed his face in remembrance of that special day back in '96 when he took the photograph of his two kids. Eleanor wore her graduation cap while Chuck wore a goofy grin. He paused in calm reflection of the hard decision he made to leave them more than a dozen years ago. There wasn't a day that went by that he didn't miss their smiles. He wondered how they were doing and what great things they had accomplished. Had they ever forgiven him for leaving them? Did they understand the sacrifice he had made to protect them from the evils of Ted Roark?
Unbeknownst to Steve, the slight gesture he had just made to stop the incessant ringing of the satellite phone was no less important than the enormous sacrifice he made years ago to protect his kids. By disconnecting that phone, he had thwarted the final connection being made to the Air Force base to the south of him. And by preventing that connection, he had saved not only his two children but millions more just like them from Predators around the world.
"Alright Chuck here's your chance to save millions, so don't be you and screw it up," Casey offered.
Chuck gave an anxious half-smile in return.
"Don't listen to Casey, you'll be fine," Sarah reassured him. "Just play your game and hopefully we'll figure out how Cheeks is communicating the code and we'll be able to stop him."
Chuck and Casey exited the van and made their way back into the tournament area separately. As Chuck made his way over to the game table he noticed that his competition was already seated and ready to play. Chuck walked over and nervously extended his hand to meet and shake the other finalist's hand. Chuck couldn't help but notice that the man was just as tense as he was.
"Hi, I'm Charles Carmichael," Chuck provided.
"Maury Cheeks. Say you look familiar," Cheeks responded deliberately, blinking his eyes a couple of times as if he was waiting for something to happen.
This guy was weird and it wasn't just his comb-over, Chuck thought. "Maybe it's the nerd herd uniform. I work at a Buy More, how about you?"
"I work for Roark Instruments, but I come here on my lunch breaks." Maury smiled easing up a bit.
Chuck looked at his watch and noticed that it was 3 o'clock and grinned, "Well, I'm supposed to be on an off-site install."
"I guess we all have our secrets don't we?" Cheeks responded. Chuck didn't miss the implicit irony in Cheeks' statement.
"Cut the chatter Bartowski, this guy is the enemy," Major Casey said through Chuck's earwig.
"I know," Chuck remarked in response to both Cheeks and Casey.
Cheeks' eyes widened and he nervously shifted in his seat upon hearing Chuck's response. Chuck couldn't help but wonder how this guy could possibly be a national security threat. He could barely keep it together and they hadn't even started to play a stupid board game for crying out loud.
"Would you like to play a game?" Cheeks smiled weakly.
"War games. Love that movie. I used to watch it all the time with my dad. I dig when the WOPR computer gets the code for the missiles and then they distract it and get it to learn by playing Tic-Tac-Toe . . . " Chuck stopped mid-sentence when he saw the NSA Agent across the room was not equally as amused.
"Too bad they didn't play Scrabble in that movie. You want to get started?" Chuck asked as he grabbed one tile and Maury did the same. Maury won the draw.
The match continued for some time while each player exchanged turns. Chuck was in the lead thanks to the help of a certain Ivy League educated wordsmith that had his ear. However, Agent Walker paid less attention to Chuck's rack this time – instead she focused on a different monitor which showed Cheeks' tiles. The wiretap that Casey had made on the new security feeds courtesy of Barak Mobility had come in handy this round. Near the end of the match, Agent Walker noticed Cheeks' rack had:
. . . . . . . . . . P-R-E-D-A-T-O. . . . . . . . . .
She looked back at the board and noticing an open 'R'.
"He's got a bingo," the Agent remarked.
"Bingo? I thought these nerds were playing Scrabble," Casey grumbled.
"No, it's a word that uses all the letters on a player's rack. He can spell out PREDATOR and get an extra 50 bonus points," Agent Walker explained.
"Wonderful, Mr. Predator here is about to spell out 'Predator' and give the Predator codes to some unknown Predator and all you want to do is shout 'Bingo'?" the Major vented.
"Hang on Casey, he's about to play," she answered.
Only, with his next play, Cheeks didn't play his bingo. Instead, he played the letters D-A- and E to spell:
. . . . . . . . . . D-A-R-E. . . . . . . . . .
Dare? Why did he play that word? Agent Walker was puzzled. Then she heard a call being made through the phone lines of the Center. Only one thing was said before the connection was severed, "Are?"
Are? She thought for a moment and suddenly she was able to put it together. 'R'!!
Whoever was watching the match, whenever Cheeks had a playable seven-letter word on his rack and didn't play the bingo, it was a code, a tell, a bingo for the bad guys watching. So the next letter that he attached his smaller word to was the next part of the Predator and Reaper encryption key. Since Cheeks had attached his word to the letter 'R,' the R had to be part of the code.
"Casey, we got it. I know how they are passing off the code. Now we've just got to figure out who Cheeks is sending the message to," Agent Walker stated.
"Roger that, I'll move into position to grab Cheeks at the end of the match, maybe that'll smoke 'em out. Bartowski you . . . 'Stay.'" the Major responded.
As Casey moved closer to the table, Maury glanced over at him. A glint of light on Casey's right hand caught his eye – Casey's service ring, Chuck saw a strange look come over Maury's face. Maury's jaw slackened. His blank stare gave way as his eyes rolled into the back of his head and his eye lids fluttered uncontrollably.
Chuck thought the guy was having a seizure. 'Great, am I going to have to give his guy CPR too?' he thought for a moment. As Chuck reached out to help him, Maury Cheeks lunged forward and let out a deep breath. Maury's eyes returned forward and he re-focused on Chuck and then on the guy that had triggered his reaction.
Casey stood there dumb-founded for a moment. He had seen that look many times before but only on one person—on the guy across the table from Maury Cheeks. If Casey didn't know better, he had just seen Maury Cheeks flash, and Cheeks had flashed on him.
Chuck noticed Casey's look and Maury's petrified stare. And then he knew.
Cheeks jumped up hitting the card-table with both knees. In one swift motion he threw the table, the board, and the tiles straight at Casey as he took off in the other direction. Casey climbed over the table and gave chase.
Chuck raised his wrist and said one word to the Agent in the van, "PINEAPPLE!"
As he bolted toward the Center's west emergency exit, Maury Cheeks inadvertently dropped something out of his coat—a gun. He was never much for guns anyway. Mere seconds behind, Casey followed in hot pursuit.
"Walker, I've been made. I don't know how he did it but that comb-over nerd had the same dazed and confused look that Bartowski gets whenever he flashes on something," Casey said as he continued west down the hallway in his quest to detain Maury Cheeks.
"How could that be?" Agent Walker asked while still running surveillance in the van.
"I don't know but I'm tracking him, it looks as though he's heading toward the construction area," Casey responded.
Agent Walker switched views of the surveillance feeds, "That's affirmative Casey, he's headed toward the emergency exit. But watch out four men just exited out of a storage room and are quickly approaching on your 6 o'clock, they must be who he's feeding the codes to. You stay on Cheeks; I'll take care of these guys. Oh and Chuck . . . ,"
"I know, Stay!" Chuck responded. He really didn't have much choice in the matter. He had just been declared the winner of the tournament given Maury's untimely and unsportsmanlike departure. As the tournament director hoisted up the trophy, the cheers from the crowd muffled the shots which were being fired due west of them by the unsavory men chasing Major Casey.
Casey ducked behind a large bundle of PVC pipe near the emergency exit. He waited for a break in the fire and then lunged for the door. He paused momentarily as he saw only air and scaffolding—it was at least a fifty foot drop off. Casey surveyed the ground and saw Cheeks already down and running west. He climbed onto the scaffolding and began to make his way down the four levels that separated them.
Due east of the real action yells of "Speech! Speech!" echoed through the crowd as Chuck took hold of the tournament trophy. It was not unlike the scene when he became Missile Command World Champion, only the crowd was much geekier. He looked out at the audience of nerds and yelled, "Thanks everybody . . . and I'll see you in Reno!" as he ran out the room in much haste and toward the van. When Chuck got to the van, he focused on the monitors to find where the other members of his team were.
As he switched feeds to an outside monitor, He saw four guys, all in black, making their way down the scaffolding in pursuit of Casey. Despite their haste the last guy remembered one thing; he kicked off the connecting scaffolding boards just outside the door to keep anyone from following them. Only these guys had no idea that the CIA's finest and perhaps most agile agent was hot on their trail.
Chuck focused on another monitor and saw Sarah run through the Center's kitchen and west to the side emergency exit past rows of PVC pipe, paint containers, and even an air compressor. She skirted all of these obstacles without breaking stride and kicked the emergency exit door open – only to be confronted with a yawning gap of air between herself and the ground fifty feet below. The tubular framework of the construction scaffolding unfolded beneath her, but no obvious walkway down seemed evident. There was something about the arrangement of the crossbars that caught her eye, though…
She backed up and ran full force as she launched herself through the door reaching out for the closest bar. Chuck watched through the other monitor as she did what only could be described as a modified Giant Swing. She grabbed on to the bar and swung through and down in a piked position legs forward. The guy on the level below stood there slack-jawed for a sliver of a moment. And then Agent Walker's feet connected with the guy's mid-section, the force of her follow-through knocked him clearly off the scaffolding as he free-fell to the ground.
"Yes! Even Reardon Payne couldn't do that move," Chuck cheered with a pumped fist.
Agent Walker continued to her next mark she saw on the level below her. She ran full steam across the landing and reached out to the pipe scaffolding on the outer edge at an angle with a half-turn to a Salto forward—changing the force of her trajectory from outward to inward. As she swung through to the next level she again extended her legs in a piked position to pick off the second man as he too fell to his demise.
Chuck couldn't even do the mental gymnastics in his head to figure out how that move was even possible. All he could think to say was, "Hello Mary Lou!"
As great as the Walker exhibition was, Chuck re-focused on the target of their mission. He noticed on another monitor that Cheeks had made his way to the ground and was getting away. For the second time in minutes, Chuck didn't obey his handlers' instructions to 'Stay'.
Chuck exited the van and took off through the Center's kitchen and toward the emergency exit. He reached the door and teetered on the edge as his fear of heights overtook him. Was it really a prerequisite to being a super spy that you had to jump off buildings? His mind raced back to all of his vertical challenges over the last year and a half—Victor Federov, Mr. Colt, and Sasha Banacek—twice. There had to be a better way this time.
There was no way that he was going to even attempt the cat-like maneuver he had just seen the female member of Team Bartowski perform. He looked around him and saw the gun.
As he made it to the ground Casey looked up above him and said, "Watch out Bartowski's got a gun."
Agent Walker looked up momentarily and the guy in black in front of her gave her a swift punch to chin. Dazed momentarily, she remembered eyes in front of you. The guy took the opportunity to run across the scaffolding and leap back inside where the scaffolding connected to the building on a lower floor. Agent Walker gave chase back inside.
A couple levels up Chuck aimed the gun at the guy running after Casey and fired, well sort of. Instead of discharging a bullet, he unloaded it. The clip fell down the scaffolding making distinctive pinging noises as it continued its journey down to the ground.
"What is it with these things?" Chuck whined as he remembered back to the Marlin heist and his failed attempt to shoot the lock off the Weinerlicious freezer to release Sarah.
As if in unison with Casey, Chuck remarked, "I've really got to learn to use one of these." While Casey said, "Never let Chuck learn to use one of those."
"This is useless," Chuck said as he dropped the gun to the floor. He looked around at the building materials and supplies surrounding the emergency exit. And a brilliant, well, a different idea sprung in his head.
He knew that one day the mashed flat duct tape in his back pocket would come in handy. He grabbed a short piece of 2" PVC next to him, reached for the end nozzle of the air compressor, sliced the end of it with the Swiss-army knife from his nerd pack (aka his pocket protector) and then wrapped the duct tape around the pipe and hose securing the connection. He ran back to the kitchen and grabbed a fruit basket ready to figuratively try a real fruit basket turnover.
Chuck shoved a banana—peel and all down the PVC pipe. The Bartowski fruit basket bazooka was loaded and ready. "Let's try the old banana in the tail pipe," he joked. He picked up the pipe and turned on the compressor with his foot. The banana shot out pathetically only a couple of feet. Not enough pressure, he thought.
Chuck grabbed an orange and shoved it in the pipe. He aimed the jerry-rigged contraption at the guy that was tailing Casey and again turned on the machine. WHOOOOSHHH!!!
Casey instinctively turned back and ducked as he noticed a flying orange whiz by his head. The guy behind him stopped and aimed his gun at Casey as he motioned for the green-shirted NSA Agent to raise his hands. Casey complied.
"Oh No!" Chuck shouted. He grabbed another orange, loaded, and fired. Casey again heard the distinctive WHOOOSHHH!!! as he noticed another projectile on its way. This friendly fire is worse than Afghanistan, he thought. The bad guy turned but never saw it coming. All he felt was a WHACK! to his face as the orange exploded sending the guy's nose straight into his skull leaving only a residue of orange sweetness.
Casey looked down at the guy on the ground and back up to Chuck, "Now that's what I call a drive by fruiting."
Agent Walker ran after the last man drawing her gun from behind her back waistband. She lost sight of him as he turned a corner. She slowed, halted at the edge of the hallway, and then peered around. The hallway was empty with the exception of several ladders, buckets, brushes, putty knives, and other painting implements. She looked down at the plastic tarps protecting the carpet; stealth was going to be a problem not only for the predator but also for her prey.
She heard plastic rustling in one of the rooms down the hall. With her gun extended in front of her she moved in a steady deliberate pace toward the noise checking each room, moving forward, and clearing her way. She noticed that the noise of movement in front of her stopped. Agent Walker peered around the doorway of what appeared to be an exercise room in the making. From the mirrored walls she saw the blur of something whiz by her and smash into a mirror in the room. It was a broken ceramic tile. She turned just in time to see another tile come at her and knock her gun away.
With full force, a body followed pushing her into the mirrored room and wedging her face-to-face between him and the step ladder behind her. A bucket on top of the ladder teetered. As Agent Walker struggled to get free of the man's grip around her throat, she grabbed an extension pole next to the ladder and forced the end of the pole down hard on the man's right foot. She planted her weight on her right foot, bent her left leg and kicked the side of his knee hard. Bye bye meniscus. The pain of his separated knee caused the man to let go of Agent Walker as he fell to the ground.
On his way down the man grabbed at the ladder and it crashed down with him. Agent Walker managed to avoid the ladder but not the bucket as it knocked her to the ground and sprayed its liquid contents all over her. She was covered from head-to-toe in spatters of blood red paint. She struggled to regain her vision as she wiped her burning eyes with the back of her hand and the collar of her jacket. As her eyes watered to clear the paint from her eyes, her vision began to return.
She noticed her enemy on the ground struggling to reach for something underneath him--her gun. As his fingers reached her gun, she grabbed at the only thing near her, a 1 ½" angled putty knife. He wrapped his hand around the trigger but before he could pull it free from under him, Agent Walker whipped forward with as much force as possible, and shoved the knife roughly straight up and into the guy's carotid artery. Suddenly, she wasn't the only one covered in paint as his neck spewed forth the red-hot liquid of life. His arm went slack. She rose up, moved his arm free with her foot and proceeded to knock away the gun.
Walker let out a deep breath of relief as she looked directly in front of her. In the mirrors opposite of her she hardly recognized the blood-red terror that was in front of her. She took off her jacket and attempted to wipe off her face with the clean underside of it. She refocused on herself in the mirror. Only that time, she noticed the red blinking light from the opposite corner of the room. As she turned toward the light and gazed into the surveillance camera that was attached to it she silently hoped that one specific person had not seen what had just transpired.
After the fruiting, Chuck ran back to the van and scanned the monitors for signs of the other member of Team Bartowski. He swiftly moved through the various surveillance feeds and found Sarah. She was covered in what looked like blood. The remaining bad guy was lying on the ground in obvious pain. He was down.
Chuck focused the monitor just in time to see her swiftly thrust the putty knife up and into the unarmed guy's neck. In horror, Chuck's jaw dropped in shock. Not again.
As Sarah stood up he saw on the wild watery look in her eyes. It was the same crazed look she had when she had gunned down Lt. Mauser. It was this same, almost evil, look that haunted his dreams.
Chuck sat stunned in the van. Would he ever get past this? Maybe he wasn't ready after all. Could he get past the real cost of his protection?
Through the blood-red paint spattered on the mirrored walls and all over herself, Agent Walker refocused and asked, "Casey, did you get Maury Cheeks?"
"No, he got away," he reluctantly admitted from outside the Center. "I'm cleaning the area right now; Bartowski sent this last guy a little high velocity Vitamin C to knock him down. Once I have him taken care of I'll take care of the other two by the scaffolding."
Sarah sighed in relief as she looked at herself in the mirrors. For once she was glad to hear that Chuck did not stay in the van. She was thankful that he didn't see the violence that had just taken place in that room. He had seen so much violence in the time that he had been sent the Intersect. As important as it was to protect him from harm, she also wanted to shield him from seeing as much of it as possible. She was thankful that he had listened to her at Christmas. She had shielded him from seeing her take down that Fulcrum agent. And she held out hope that he hadn't seen what had just transpired. She knew how much the violence had changed her since she had joined the CIA—how it had numbed her. She didn't want Chuck to experience the deadened morality of a spy's life she thought as she continued to wipe off as much of the red paint as possible from her body.
"Chuck are you alright?" she asked but received no response. "Chuck?" she asked again.
"Yeah," he responded weakly.
"Can you meet me at the van?" Sarah responded as she slipped out the back and around to the van.
"Yeah."
"Casey, I'm covered from head-to-toe in paint, can you take care of one more?" Sarah deliberately asked specifically not mentioning the word 'body' as she knew Chuck was listening.
"Roger that, I've got a team on the way. What's the location?" Casey asked.
"On the second level, it's a mirrored exercise room. You can't miss it there's red paint everywhere," she responded.
"I'll meet you back at the castle at 0500 for a briefing with the General."
It was a day of firsts, Chuck thought in cold silence as the drove the van back to Burbank. He had won a Scrabble tournament, may have seen a guy flash, face planted another guy with an orange, and now he was driving the van.
One experience was not a first though—he had seen Sarah kill another unarmed man. Was this common place and he just didn't realize it? Was he that naïve to think that the price of national security--that the cost of his protection didn't involve such loathsome measures? He sighed. It was so hard to think about a time when he didn't dwell on such things and how much they had changed him and his view of the world. He didn't want to lose his idealism but on long days like this one it was hard not to feel it slipping away. He wanted to talk to her about what he saw but would she understand? Would she care? He looked up to the rearview mirror and glanced back at her. But he couldn't really look at her. Even with her hair pulled up and jacket off, she looked too much like Carrie with all of the red-blood paint still on her. It was her appearance that had caused him to drive (in the remote chance that they might be recognized or detained in some other way).
He was thankful that he was driving because he had to physically focus on the road and not on her. He really needed to talk to her about it but it was just too fresh in his mind. What he really wanted was to lie down, to sleep, to get some real rest, and to forget about all of that had just happened. But he couldn't do any of those things.
He glanced back at Sarah again and noticed that she was carefully filling out some unknown paperwork. She noticed him look her in the rearview mirror and so she said, "Some off-site install, huh?"
"Yeah," he muttered. That was the third 'yeah' he had given her. He knew that whatever the next question was he was going to have to give something more in response or she'd start 'fishing' for answers -- questions and answers that they just didn't have the time to go into because he had to get back to the Buy More. But the mundane task of fixing computers at the Buy More would be a welcome relief at this point.
Chuck pulled around to the back of the Orange Orange to let Sarah get out with as little attention as possible. He knew that she could sense something was wrong but for some reason she didn't push him. All she said was, "I'll come by after I get cleaned up and after my briefing with the General."
"Okay," he said as he stared blankly forward.
"Oh, and don't forget this," Sarah said as she put his briefcase up front along with the BuyMore off-site installation paperwork.
Chuck looked at the paperwork for moment and noticed the signature,
. . . . . . . . . . Katie O'Connell . . . . . . . . . .
"Wait, who's Katie O'Connell?" Chuck asked.
"Oh, she was someone I used to know from Wisconsin," she half-smiled through the paint and continued, "Someone who would have liked to have been a semi-pro Scrabble Champion."
"Well maybe you could get this to her," Chuck said as he handled Sarah the trophy and said, "I think she earned it today."
Agent Walker fresh from scrubbing the remaining paint from her person sat down at the conference table in the Castle. She was as good as new in her Orange Orange finest when Casey arrived a few minutes before 5 o'clock.
General Beckman appeared on the screen in front of them.
"Major Casey. Agent Walker. What news do you have to report on this afternoon's mission?"
"General, we were able to determine the source of the leak—Maury Cheeks. Through our infiltration of the tournament we were able to determine that Cheeks has been using these Scrabble competitions as a smokescreen to deliver the encryption keys for the MQ-1 Predators and MQ-9 Reapers," Major Casey reported.
"The 432d wing at Creech Air Force Base in Indian Springs has confirmed that neither the Predators nor the Reapers were ever activated and so it seems as though your team was able to stop Cheeks from completing his treason," the General remarked.
"We still don't know who Cheeks was communicating with since none of the men who gave chase survived," Agent Walker responded.
"Well, at least you were able to secure Mr. Cheeks, I presume," the General assumed.
"No General, Cheeks got away, however, we have dispatched men to his residence. If we are unable to secure him before the next tournament, we believe infiltrating his employer--Roark Instruments—with an inside man, may assist us in securing Cheeks as well as determine how he is obtaining the codes in the first place," Major Casey responded and stopped.
"There's something else you should know General. It does not appear that Cheeks is aware that we have determined how he is passing the launch codes . . ." Agent Walker offered as she began the footage from the final round of the Scrabble Tournament.
"However, as you can see in this footage, something definitely spooked him." She watched Beckman react as she viewed the same footage they were seeing in the Castle – Cheeks' face contorting as his eyes lost focus, his jaw fell slack and he… flashed?
"Further, we believe," Walker continued, turning her head slightly to catch a matching, tense glance from Casey, "that there's a possibility that… at least we think that there could be . . ."
"Just tell her Walker," the Major interjected.
She gathered herself, took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "General, we believe that Cheeks may have 'flashed' on Casey."
On the screen, Beckman's face changed from an expression of puzzlement to one of realization and finally to one of ire.
"Agent Walker, are you telling me that there may be another Intersect running around on the loose in Los Angeles and we don't know anything about it?"
5:05 p.m.
Jeff smiled in anticipation. Thanks to the strange-looking overgrown hobbit of a green-shirt named Fergie, Fernandez, or something like that, he had finally learned a secret that not even Morgan's beard held. He knew where Chuck went. For so long he had thought of Chuck as being 'much cooler' than everyone else that worked in BuyMoria. But now he knew Chuck's secret, he knew where Chuck went when he went 'nerd-slumming.' And all it cost him was a t-shirt and a front-row pass at Jeffster's next gig.
"Bartowski, where you been?" Big Mike asked from outside his door as Chuck made his way to the nerd herd technical support desk.
"Off site install," he responded.
Oh yeah, Jeff grinned as Chuck set down his hard case and set his work order paperwork down in the 'in' box on the desk. But before Jeff could open his mouth, Chuck's main squeeze in the Orange Orange uniform walked into the Buy More. As usual, she positively glowed. She looked as though she had stepped straight out of a magazine. Jeff looked at the creepy Fernandino and grimaced. Jeff wondered why they couldn't hire babes like her to be the green-shirts rather than weirdoes like that guy, girl, or whatever 'it' was.
Chuck walked around the front of the desk to meet her. He noticed how refreshed she looked. There were no cuts, bruises, or signs of paint. He thought that the CIA must have some amazing paint remover as her hair was positively glistening. She leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek and that's when he noticed the remnant of something behind her ear.
"Hi, uhh Sweetie," Chuck responded. He knew right away what he needed to do. He wasn't a spy, but he definitely knew what this 'good spy' in front of him would want him to do to maintain their cover under the circumstances.
If anything, Sarah knew her asset and he was not one for PDA. Yet, he lingered in front of her longer than the customary cover kiss that had become part of their routine when she visited him at the Buy More. In her peripheral vision, she could see Jeff and several of Chuck's other strange co-workers looking at them. For the sake of their cover, she couldn't back away from him. She knew she was stuck there.
Chuck looked into her eyes and then her lips. She couldn't help but look longingly into his eyes. In her mind she thought back to when she taught him that a 'good spy knows what their mark wants.' She was confused, no intrigued, that after a day like today, that he was doing this. It didn't make sense. Was she the mark? Why here?
He brushed back her hair as he caressed her ear with his thumb; around the curl, over the top, and then gently down and back behind her ear. She caught her gasp realizing that this was no spy move, no cover move. She struggled to keep her focus as the sensations flooded in, threatening to paralyze her. The touch of his hand on her face, along her neck; his fingers curling behind her ear -- it was nearly overpowering. Her surprise and fascination with the question of what Chuck was doing wasn't helping -- she couldn't get her mind past it and found herself following along with the seduction, playing the part of the mesmerized target. She needed more time to think, but he was too far ahead of her and she was losing the fight to rein in her emotions. As he drew her in, at last, for a long showy kiss, she had just enough presence of mind left to be thankful that to outward appearances their cover was still probably intact. If not, well . . . she'd fix it later. Relinquishing everything else to future consideration, she closed her eyes and parted her lips in anticipation. And then she felt him gently scratch behind her ear.
Just as his lips touched hers he whispered, only loud enough for her to hear, "You had paint behind your ear."
Sarah's eyes popped open and fixed on his as her face broke into a smile of understanding. She felt a great sense of relief (and disappointment, she realized before hurriedly tucking that thought away). Chuck had saved their cover once again, in a way that she hadn't expected -- he really was starting to think like a spy. His one-time seduction instructor was fascinated in ways that couldn't put into thoughts or words. And judging from the gathered crowd, she wasn't the only one that was fascinated by their display—but, of course, the crowd's fascination was for very different reasons.
The crowd that had gathered was awestruck from the display from the coolest guy in the store and his lovely yogurt queen.
"Chuck really does have it all. First, it was the babe, then Missile Command World Champion, and now he's set his sights on the world," Jeff told the crowd of green-shirts.
"Wuh? What are you talking about Jeff?" Chuck questioned.
"We know your secret," Jeff slyly responded.
A sense of dread began to creep up from within the agent. Her mind raced back to her interrogation of the drunk. Why hadn't he said anything before? Apparently, it had been a mistake not to use the usual CIA interrogation tactics and now she was going to pay for her mistake. They all knew Chuck's secret. They knew he was the Intersect.
And now, it was all over. She moved her hand toward her watch ready to alert Casey and activate an emergency lockdown of the whole store. As she looked wide-eyed at Chuck, she continued to arrange all of the necessary steps in her mind to get him to a secure location and fast. Agent Walker was ready to move. That was--until Jeff spoke again.
"What? You want me to spell it out?" he remarked.
"S-C-A-R-B-E-L-L"
Sarah's look of relief gave way to laughter as Jeff mistakenly 'misspelled' Chuck's secret.
"But don't worry, your secret is safe with us—for now that is!" Jeff gave a wicked smile to the couple.
February 2, 2009
Your secret is safe with us. Jeff's words had rung in his ears for the better part of a week.
But Chuck wasn't thinking about scrabble or even all the deadly Intersect secrets in his head. All he could think about were the secrets that Sarah was keeping from him.
Chuck and Sarah stood face-to-face by the fountain as they watched Tyler Martin leave the courtyard. He was so conflicted by his thoughts and emotions and his psyche was bearing the brunt of it.
He had thought he had put this all behind him after New Year's. But seeing her kill that man at the Scrabble tournament had brought all of his apprehensions painfully back to the forefront. He knew that she could sense his awkwardness around her but there always seemed to be a mission to focus on or worse someone around such that he had to keep up the cover charade of their relationship.
He hadn't had any real sleep for the better part of a week. When he shut his eyes, all he kept doing was flashing back to Sarah with a gun shooting Lt. Mauser or Sarah wielding a knife and shoving it deep into that guy's neck. In the last couple nights, his dreams had changed. She wasn't killing these bad guys in cold-blood. In his nightmares, she was killing him!
He had taken it upon himself not to delay this talk any longer. This secret was driving him slowly insane. He had to talk to her about it. The only problem was that that cheesy rock star, Tyler Martin, had a bad habit of getting in the way. He had to talk to her about it now otherwise he'd never get past it. But he didn't know how to start the conversation.
As the pop star left the courtyard, Sarah lingered. She could tell that something had really been bothering him. It was time to talk to him. And if he didn't tell her now who knew if they'd ever get past whatever it was that had been steadily bothering him since Christmas.
She looked at him earnestly and asked, "Look, if there is something bothering you then please tell me, I know part of your job is to have all these secrets in your head . . . but you're not supposed to keep them from me."
He couldn't help but think about the irony of her last sentence. In their failure to communicate they had both kept secrets from one another. She had always wanted him to trust her but had drawn the line at belief. On the other hand, he couldn't understand the nuance in her distinction. He wanted both—trust and belief.
"Yeah, I know, I know," his voice trailed off as she continued to wait on him to be honest and to tell her what was on his mind.
The silence of the moment was almost unbearable. He looked back at her and swallowed hard. He really wanted to believe in her but he knew that he couldn't if he wasn't honest himself with her in that moment. And so he couldn't help but let the truth of what he saw spill out. "I saw you shoot that Fulcrum agent on Christmas Eve. After they took over the Buy More and when I asked you about it . . ."
"I lied," she admitted breaking his eye contact. She couldn't look at him; her guilt shown through in this small but significant gesture.
"Chuck I have to protect you," she said trying to rationalize her actions.
"I know that," he started and stepped forward closer to her. He had to get it off of his chest and at the same time he needed an explanation, a reason, something to explain 'Why?' she had done what she did. He continued, "I know that you do. You were protecting me, you protecting all of us, he threatened my family, my friends, and you were just doing your job, I get that. . . ."
It was hard for her to hear all of these things but she knew he was right. Everything he said was true. But it was the next statement that he made that really hit home.
". . . but Sarah the guy was unarmed and you just. . ."
"I did what I had to do. He knew who you really were. Your whole family was in danger, and I'm sorry," she apologized sincerely but then she changed the subject, "sometimes I forget that you never asked for all of this." In doing so, she responded while not really responding at all.
This time it was Chuck that broke his eye contact. He knew that was all she was going to give him and still he didn't know if it was truly enough. He sadly looked down as his voice trailed off to some other place, "There are parts I'm not sure I'll ever get used to. . . ."
She swallowed deliberately at his statement. She looked down as she struggled for the words to respond and then they came. "Well, you deserve a break so take tonight, tomorrow, whatever you need, it's yours."
"Seriously? Really?" Chuck couldn't believe what she was saying but before the full import of her statement really set in she continued.
"Yeah, no missions, no cameras, no Casey…" she searched for all the things she thought were causing him stress – and as she got to the bottom of the list she knew, instinctively, what the last item had to be, "…no thermal satellite surveillance, and no me." Sarah made sure to keep a neutral expression on her face as she said the last item on her list, but her eyes watched attentively for his reaction. Would he contradict her? Tell her he didn't need time away from her? Or would he accept her statement at face value, confirming her worst fears that she had become just one more part of a spy existence that he wanted nothing to do with?
"You guys use satellites?" Chuck kidded weakly. Even subconsciously he wasn't prepared to respond to a life without her. So he involuntarily hung onto the comment she made just before and verbalized it. Still, that part within him knew that it wasn't the lack of satellites that terrified him. He could do without the satellites. She was the one thing that he didn't want to do without. And she was still the thing that had so distressed him all of these weeks since Christmas.
Inwardly, Sarah sighed, part thankful and part disappointed that Chuck had not taken her bait. She smiled at his question. "Yeah. And Chuck when you are ready again we'll be waiting," she responded, more out of hope for a future, any future with him. She hoped that he would be ready for her again someday.
As Chuck was thinking about her offer, Casey walked out with two duffel bags of gear and handed one of them to Sarah.
"Hey what's this, what's going on?" Chuck asked.
"Lock and load," the Major responded.
"A new mission, we'll see you tomorrow," Sarah said as she took the bag of gear from Casey.
"Wait, a new mission? What kind of mission?" Chuck asked as Casey mock saluted him on their way out of the courtyard.
"It's fine, Chuck, we got it." Sarah smiled as she exited with Casey.
"What kind of mission?" Chuck asked again, this time to himself. As he watched the retreating backs of Casey and Sarah, he realized that something wasn't right. Sarah's open-ended offer to take as much time as he needed – away from the missions, cameras, Casey and even her should have brought him relief but it didn't. Suddenly things didn't just seem different; they were different. Although he had not asked for the Intersect; he had not asked for the life of a spy; he had not asked to be a government asset – he was being offered a choice. And the way he felt right now… He couldn't deny how the missions, their team, and yes, she had become so important to him. The things that he had dreaded doing only moments before, he already missed.
With a resigned grin, he recognized the irony in his situation. He'd fought so long for what he thought he wanted and when he'd finally gotten it, it turned out to be hollow and unappealing. He recognized that what he really needed, he'd already had. So yes, he was being given a choice. But as it turned out, the choice was simple and his decision was much easier than he would have ever expected.
Chuck ran after them and jumped into the back of Casey's 1985 Crown Victoria. Sarah turned and stared blankly at him, then to Casey, and back to Chuck as her jaw dropped ever so slightly. What was he doing? She'd just expended no small amount of effort convincing General Beckman to let Chuck have a few days of down time. Isn't that what he wanted? Had she misread his true feelings - again?
"Hey guys, where we going?" he asked as he looked at both Casey and then Sarah.
She met Chuck's eyes then and appraised them for intention. What are you doing? She asked in her silent stare. And in his returning gaze, she saw the truth – he really wanted to be here, it wasn't an act. He chose to be with them . . . with her. She took in a breath, accepting his decision and trying to still the growing swell of warmth in her heart – and shifted her focus to Casey.
"Well come on Casey, there's no time for a break! We've got work to do!" Chuck taunted with a lifted spirit.
Sarah turned away from both of them to hide the pleased smile she could not suppress. Whether he wanted the missions, the cameras, Casey, the satellites, any of it was of no import to her at that moment. Because Sarah Walker knew that when it had come right down to it – when he'd had to choose between a few days of his old existence and the harsh new realities of the spy world he had chosen the spy world. And on some level she knew that she had been a big part of his decision. Maybe there was hope, she thought. Maybe they could have a future together – something more than what their current circumstances would allow. More than she had dared to hold out any hope for. Together.
Even though Sarah had turned away, Chuck caught her retreating smile and he knew that he'd pleased her. He returned a satisfied smile to her, but she never turned back to catch it. How was this so easy? Why couldn't they have talked about this a month ago? Do all conversations started by Sarah Walker end up this way? He turned his attention back to Casey, his question still hanging in the air after several seconds had gone by.
"As long as it's not scrabble," the Major grunted as the pulled out of the parking lot.
"What, you don't want me to 'spell it' out for you?" the nerd asked, a sardonic expression on his face.
2/9/09 BuyMore
Spelling it out to Jeff had been the smartest thing Fernando had ever done. Before that day a few weeks ago he didn't know if he'd ever have had the nerve to approach his idol. But the reward had definitely exceeded the risk. Fernando was on the front row of Jeffster's gig at the BuyMore! Jeffster rocks! They were so much cooler than that Tyler Martin phony. Plus he knew the band! He had on his new Jeffster t-shirt and they were singing his favorite song--Africa by Toto. It was just like Morgan said, 'Things couldn't get any better than this.' Well, maybe if that girl from the kegger came back. Until then, there was always (1) Jeffster; (2) Scrabble; and (3) BuyMoria. As long as he had those things, Fernando's world was complete. He mouthed the words along with the band:
. . . . . . . . . . It's gonna take a lot to drag me away from you. . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . There's nothing that a hundred men or more could ever do. . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . I bless the rains down in [BuyMoria] . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . Gonna take some time to do the things we never had. . . . . . . . . .
As his favorite band sang his favorite song in his favorite land, Fernando couldn't think of a better way to spell out a perfect day.
[Has Chuck gone to the dogs? Where's Anna? And will Chuck ever flash in Chuck v. The Burning Man? All these questions and more will be answered in Chapter 10—Man's Best Friend is a Dog in Heat].
[A/N: If what you read strikes you in some way, I'd love to hear about it! I'm notorious for putting your awesome ideas to work in this story. Plus, if you post a review, I promise to send you a scoop as I work on the next chapter!]
[To all my interactive reader pals: The pink iPod is coming back soon so here's your chance to weigh-in on songs that Chuck would have added to his 'Sarah iPod' since New Year's Eve through to the end of Chuck v. The Predator. Your lovely suggestions of songs that Chuck would think would reflect their relationship during this timeframe are welcomed! If you'd like a copy of the complete playlist as it now exists, send me a PM!]
