A/N:The Awesome awards voting is still ongoing, I believe. Shameless self-promotion time. I'm up for several of them, and I've yet to win one. So, if you do stop by the forums and vote, think of me.

Sorry for the delay, but this chapter wasn't cooperationing. Yes, that's a word now, I made it up. This chapter is a little schizophrenic, just due to the length of time that it covers, so please pay attention to the dates.

Chapter 10: Changes

Andrews AFB

September 28, 2011

2200 EST

"Hey, moron," Casey said when they deplaned. The Colonel was alone on the tarmac. Chuck winced.

"Sarah didn't come to pick me up? Is she mad?"

"That's like asking if napalm burns underwater."

"I don't understand. Is that a yes?"

Casey raised an eyebrow. "And how. She punched a wall."

"What?"

"You need me for this? I'm gonna catch a cab," Kevin said, handing over the plastic bag holding the captured PDA and walking off. Casey nodded and stuffed the bag into a pocket. Chuck waved, and Kevin rolled his eyes.

"She punched a wall?"

"Yeah, when Myers let her see the transcript of your report."

"So, is it even safe for me to go home?"

Casey just shrugged. "As safe as it ever was."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Chuck stopped in his tracks in the parking lot.

"Walker ever tell you she threatened Beckman with a needlenose pliers?"

"What?"

"When they had you in the bunker."

"I don't remember her mentioning- I... She wouldn't use pliers on meif that's what you're implying."

Casey shrugged again. "You say so," and pulled out the key fob for the Crown Vic.

Chuck blinked. At first he'd thought it was merely a different Vic, but he could see the scratch in the door from their last misadventure in LA. "How did you get it here from LA?"

"Hired a guy I know to drive it for me."

"It's got a rocket launcher. Who did you let drive it?" Chuck said as he got in.

"Old marine buddy of mine. And the rocket launcher's got a biometric lockout."

"Well that's something."

They spent most of the car trip from Andrews in silence, until Casey stopped out front of the apartment building. "When are they going to be done with the house?" Casey said.

"We're supposed to go check it out tomorrow after work. Then we start moving in Friday if Sarah thinks its up to snuff."

"You need an extra pair of hands for that?"

"Casey are you offering to help me move?"

"That's what friends do, isn't it?"

"Yeah," Chuck said. "I never expected you to admit we were friends, though."

"You try to hug me I'll still punch you in the throat. But sure. We're friends."

Chuck nodded. "A needlenose pliers? Really?"

"Yes. Quite the girl you've got there, Bartowski. Don't do anything to piss her off more than she already is."

"I'll do my best," Chuck said.

"Good luck," Casey called as he pulled out.

Chuck squared his shoulders and marched upstairs.

"Sarah? Hon?" Chuck cracked the door and stuck his head through. The apartment was dark. He glanced at his watch. 11pm. He'd tried to sleep on the plane, but Myers' had demanded their debriefing take place as soon as possible, which meant over the secure phone unit built into the plane. It was a new model, which integrated advances in encryption technology and was supposedly completely uncrackable. Still, Chuck kept from mentioning the Intersect, and Myers refrained from using anybody's real name. There were risks, and risks. Chuck sidled through the door and closed and locked it behind him.

If Lisa was still sick, he'd thought Sarah might still be up, but the apartment just felt asleep. Chuck dropped his keys on the plate by the door and took off his shoes, so his footsteps wouldn't wake either of his girls, and padded through to the bedroom.

The bedroom door was locked. Chuck rattled the handle once before he remembered he was trying to keep the noise down and froze, praying he hadn't woken Lisa. The girl could scream when she wanted to.

He knocked gently. "Sarah?" No answer.

He sighed and turned, leaning his back against the doorframe and hunching his shoulders. It was a few seconds before he spotted his pillow and the folded sheet set on the end of the sofa. Hell. Chuck rapped on the door a little louder, hoping for a balance between loud enough to wake Sarah, but not wake Lisa. "Sarah, can you come open the door? Please? Are you up?"

"I'm up."

"Can we talk?"

"Go to sleep," Sarah said through the door. "You'll wake up the baby. I just finally got her down."

"Come out here and talk to me."

No answer for the longest time, then finally. "Go to sleep."

"Sarah, come on!" Chuck whispered. He thought he might have heard a muffled sob through the door, but that was all. He bonged his head on the door softly and went to go make up the couch. He couldn't get comfortable at first, and he finally had to get up and pour himself a double of Johnny Walker from Casey's 'apartment warming' gift.

"Chuck," she whispered, and he opened his eyes. Sarah was sitting on the edge of the sofa, leaning over him.

"What- it's the middle of the night. You ready to talk now?"

She nodded. "I'm sorry about before. I just—"

"You were too mad to talk. I get it."

"I wasn't mad. I was scared."

Chuck frowned. "I don't think I've ever heard you say that before."

"I'm sure you have," Sarah said. "God, I was so scared."
"I'm sorry I scared you," Chuck said. "Nobody expected them to be out in force like that."

"I know that," Sarah shook her head. "It's not even this last mission that scared me so much. It's just... I wasn't there. It's so much worse staying home while you go on missions, not knowing until after the fact. I hate it."

"Now you know how I feel staying in the van all the time."

Sarah glared at him halfheartedly, fighting a grin. "Don't try to make this a joke."

"I wasn't—"

She put a finger to his lips. "I know, Sarah's talking now. Okay?"

"Yeah," he nodded.

"I don't want you going out on another mission without me. We're partners. A package deal, from now on."

"What about— somebody needs to stay home with Lisa, and god forbid. What if we both..."

"Then Lisa goes and lives with aunt Ellie and uncle Devon," Sarah said. "But if we're going to come to a bad end, Chuck, it's going to be together. I don't like talking about this. I don't even like thinking about this, but having you gone, it all just came in on me at once. And then when I heard you were missing."

"I wasn't missing. I knew where I was the whole time. Mostly. London is a very confusing city."

She hit him with the baby blues, that soulful look she used to give him back in the bad old days and he nodded. He mimed locking his mouth shut.

"Kevin calls in saying they've lost contact with you but don't worry he's sure everything's fine," Sarah said, "And Lisa's screaming and my boobs feel like bricks, and ugh! I hated feeling that helpless."

"Helpless? You? You're my kickass ninja spy girl. You don't know the meaning of the word."

Sarah shrugged one shoulder. "I told you what a wreck I was when you were in the bunker, didn't I? I can't raise our daughter by myself. I just— Chuck, I can't. Don't make me try to do this without you."

"Don't cry. Sarah, please don't. We don't even know if we're going to go on more missions anyway."

She shook her head. "That's what I'm talking about. As painful as it is. We need to plan for this. We said no missions, but then it was 'oh, this is a milk run, it'll be fine,' and we both saw how that turned out. There will be another mission, and a one after that, just wait and see. Until we retire completely, there's always be 'one more mission.'"

Chuck nodded. "And if there is, we'll both go. We can get a sitter for Lisa; Myers will have a list of approved sitters. Or he can get one. I guess we can get a second fridge for out in the garage—can you freeze breast milk so we can have like a spare week's supply on hand?"

Sarah just looked at him for a long time. "I love you so much," she finally said. "Don't scare me like that again."

"I never wanted to," Chuck said.

"I know it," she said. "It's the nature of this damn business, and I know that too."

"Can I sit up? This is a little awkward talking like this."

"No," Sarah said. There were still tears on her cheek, but the side of her mouth quirked upward and she pushed him back down and pressed her lips to his.

"Ulp—" Chuck said, startled for a moment by her aggressiveness. He kissed her back after that moment of shock, but his moment of indecision had given her all the advantage she needed. Sarah pinned him to the sofa. He smiled against the onslaught and slid his hand up under her shirt.

She pulled away for a moment and grabbed his shirt. "Arms up," she said, and then all bets were off.

Chuck surged up and spun her down beside him. Sarah grinned and rubbed her fingers in his chest hair. Chuck shivered away from her fingers for a moment and she bucked back to haul her own shirt off over her head, tossing it aside and kissing him with renewed fervor.

Afterward, Sarah curled up on top of him, head resting on his shoulder. "You cold?" Chuck said, trying to flip the sheet up around her shoulders. "We should move back to the bedroom."

Sarah pushed herself up on her elbows. "Huh, no. Sorry, buster. You're still sleeping on the couch tonight."

"But we just— twice!"

"Shh!" Sarah said. But it was too late. Lisa's wail came from both the bedroom and the baby monitor Sarah had clipped to the only bit of clothing she was still wearing, her maternity bra. She sat up and began stepping into her panties.

Chuck grabbed her wrist. "I can get her," he said.

"All the bottles are dirty," Sarah said. She stood and settled the waistband on her hips. "This is a job for Super-mommy."

"Can I at least see my daughter?"

"In the morning."

"Oh, come on!"

"This is your fault for getting into trouble, don't try to blame me."

Chuck frowned at her retreating back. And then cocked his head and took the moment to ogle his wife's butt. She glanced back over her shoulder, and put a little more sway in her steps to torture him, before banging the door shut with her hip.

He let out a sigh and tried to get back to sleep on the couch.

Barely ten minutes had passed before Sarah poked her head back out and relented. "Don't get any ideas, you're still in trouble. It's just hard to sleep without my best pillow," Sarah said. "Don't smirk."

CIA HQ

Langley, VA

Oct 1, 2011

S&T couldn't crack the encryption on Nathaniel Barnard's PDA, at least not right away. Chuck and

Jesus talked about it over lunch, and he called Myers from his cube. Strictly speaking that was a breach of protocol, but what wasn't when he really got down to it? Even when he'd been locked up in a bunker he hadn't felt quite so hemmed in. "Chuck, you know the drill," Myers said. "You shouldn't be calling me. Unless something big came up? I'm talking 9/11 big, here, Chuck."

"Sorry, Bill,"Chuck said. "It's just that Jesus—ah, Jones and I were talking over lunch—"

"You're not supposed to be—"

"He's an old frat buddy," Chuck said. "How is that suspicious?" He glanced around and hunched over the phone, "And I think I can help crack that PDA."

"So, what are you asking me for?"

"I need a transfer to S&T."

"That'll mean upgrading your security clearance."

"Isn't that really just a technicality at this point?"

"It'd also mean a paygrade bump."

"It would? Really, I wasn't aware of that."

"Your lying needs work, Bartowski. I'll call your supervisor tomorrow morning and give him the news."

"Can you call him now? He's been kind of a pain in my butt all day."

"And you want to watch his expression. Can't you get your amusements somewhere else?"

"I could but Quantico's more than an hour by car."

"Are you sure you've got the right Bartwoski, Deputy Director?" Gerald said. "It's just that, he's always late, he's always getting personal calls and—"

"I'm sure," Myers said. "That last report of his just crossed my desk. Dynamite stuff,and he's got history with Jones over in S&T."

"Sir," Gerald said. "About that report; something is wrong. There's no way he could have produced that many pages in the time frame I gave him."

"What are you suggesting?"

"I don't know," Gerad admitted. "Maybe it's nothing. Maybe I just miss being out in the field and I'm making up conspiracies where there are none."

"Go give Bartowski the word, then," Myers said. "Unless there's something else?"

"No sir," Gerald said. He stared at the phone for a moment after the DDO had hung up. Bartowski. The man was hiding something, and Myers was in on it too. He said it aloud in the privacy of his office. "Charles Bartowski is in a secret conspiracy with the Director of Operations." It sounded ridiculous, worse than ridiculous. He grit his teeth. He was not paranoid. "And I'm going to find out what it is."

"So, what's this I hear you're leaving us, Chuck?" Anders said, rubbing his bald head.

"Well," Chuck said. "I'm just going to a different part of the building..."

"No, I mean, you're getting TS clearance and everything," Anders said. "Only having Secret clearance was what bound us together as a group."

"I think you're overstating things. I mean I've only been working here for like a month."

"I'm really not, but I guess you're too big a hotshot to hang out with us here. We're like the Jerry Tubermanns of the CIA."

"Who?" Chuck said. "I don't think I know him."

"He was the creepy kid at my highschool. Hey, you've got to come out with us tonight," Anders said. "We're going out for drinks at this great CIA bar."

"Hang on. There are CIA bars? Is that like a cop bar?"

"Kind of, except the owner used to work covert ops," Anders said.

Mark, one of the other Iceland Desk analysts overhead and paused. "He's got a stuffed polar bear he shot on some mission in Russia back in the sixties," Mark said. "It's great for photo ops."

"He shot a polar bear? They're endangered," Chuck frowned. 'photo ops' with polar bears? This place sounded nuts.

"It was a different time," Clarence said. What were they all just waiting outside his cube? That was everybody now.

Chuck shrugged. "I don't know... I'd have to ask my wife..."

"Boo!" "Jeer!" "You don't actually say jeer!" "I don't want to have this argument with you again!"

"Okay, fine," Chuck said."I'll have one drink."

Sarah pulled the phone away from her ear, wincing. Loud music and wild shouting reached her ears even through the intervening space. She grimaced and put the phone back to her ear. "Who is this? Why do you have Chuck's phone?"

"It's me!" A voice slurred, and her eyes widened as she finally recognized it.

"Where have you been. I'm at the house. Are— are you drunk?"

"Noooooooo..." Chuck said. "Maybe. A lilbit... jus a lilbit."

"I can barely hear you," Sarah raised her voice.

"Hang on. Hey everybody everybody, shh!"

"Chuck, where are you?"

"I lub you so much..." Chuck slurred. "You're sooo pretty..." Hoots and catcalls rose over the phone-line.

Sarah rolled her eyes. "I'm going to come get you."

"It's calld... whas it called guys?" A shout from half a dozen throats, also drunk and slurring, but she puzzled it out after a moment.

"The Black Helicopter!"

Sarah sighed. "Okay, how much have you had?"

"Dunno. We've been here for 'bout a hour. Lots?"

"Chuck, don't drink any more beer."

"Excullent," Chuck said and raised his voice. "Whiskey for everyone!"

Sarah pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Is everything alright?" Asked their contractor. "Is that your husband?"

"Yes. I know why he's late, now. He's plastered."

"But, it's... only five thirty in the afternoon."

"I know," Sarah groaned. "We're going to have to cut this short, if you don't mind."

"Sure," the man said. "Is everything looking like you expected?"

"Yes, I think the panic room turned out great," Sarah said. "And the security system is perfect. I know it was a lot of extra work for you and your guys..."

"Hey, thats why the Company pays us the big bucks."

"Really?"

"Double overtime is better than sex."

"You're doing it wrong," Sarah said confidently, and strolled over to where Lisa was sleeping in her car seat.

"Which one?" the man grinned.

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Both."

The Black Helicopter Bar and Grill catered to a certain kind of patron, and it wasn't a kind that Sarah was all that enamored with; the place was a kind of kitschy spy-dive bar, with just enough credibility and spy cred that a lot of the analysts flocked there. When Sarah had first started working at CIA all those years ago, she'd let herself be dragged there by her roommate from the Farm. Sarah stared at the place from the safety of the minivan, fingers drumming on the wheel. She needed to go in and get Chuck, of course, but she wasn't really thrilled with that plan, so she dug her iPhone out of her purse and dialed Chuck.

It went straight to voicemail, which meant someone had probably made him turn it off. She heaved a sigh, and unhooked Lisa from the car-seat. Her three-month-old daughter fussed a little, flailing arms making it difficult to get her into the Baby-Bjorn, but Sarah cooed at her and made funny faces until Lisa seemed to tire herself out a little, and then got the straps fitted into place.

Lisa was getting bigger, and they'd have to buy a new harness at some point. Sarah shook her head. "Mental note," she said aloud.

At the door, the management had someone checking ID, and Sarah was forced to dig in her baby bag. "Seriously?" she protested, "I don't look 21 to you? I'd say thank you, but seriously?"

"Policy," the man said. His eyes darted to Sarah's chest, and for once a man wasn't ogling her boobs. "You know this isn't a family restaurant, right?" he waved vaguely, taking in Lisa with the gesture.

"Yeah," Sarah said. "I've been here before."

She moved into the bar, thankfully smoke free, in deference to city ordinances, or she'd have had to bust some heads, and found Chuck in the very back of the bar, through the secret bookcase door. The drunk pack of Intel analysts stopped their raucous conversation and stared at her.

Chuck blinked and took in the scowl on his wife's face. "Busted..." he said in what was obviously meant to be a whisper, but was closer in volume to a shout.

"Hang on..." one of the others said slowly, hiccuped and had to start over. He seemed to lose track of what he was saying for a few moments. "Hang on. Hang on... Haaang on. That's your wife?"

Chuck grinned drunkenly and tried to get up and go over to her, but he staggered and nearly fell. Sarah started to rush forward and catch him, but at the last instant he stiffened his knees and managed to stay upright. "I'm in trouble again, aren't I?"

Sarah smiled at him and shook her head. "Not with me," she said. "Your hangover will be punishment enough. Drink tons of water, it should help. A little"

As promised, that particular hangover remedy only worked partially, and the next morning, as they were meeting the CIA-approved movers at the house, Chuck's head was still painful. He felt like a giant bobble-head, as if his neck was grown tiny and his head two sizes too large. When he remarked on this fact to his wife, she merely smirked and cuddled Lisa against her shoulder. "Well, what do you expect?" she said, "How many shots did you have?"

"I lost count at four," Chuck said. "But that was after a few beers anyway. I broke my own rule from my frat days. 'Beer then liquor never sicker. Liquor then beer, never fear'."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "You are not having the drinking talk with our daughter."

Casey pulled up a little after noon, the cigar store Indian strapped to the roof of the Crown Vic.

Sarah sighed. She'd thought Morgan had been given permanent custody of that thing. Chuck and Casey had to wrestle the thing upstairs themselves, since the movers were only technically paid to move the things from the truck.

Chuck and Casey used the behemoth to shuttle boxes from the apartment, while Sarah oversaw the unloading of the moving truck with their new furniture.

"Okay," Casey said, when the movers were finished and they'd carted over the last load of boxes, making a huge mess in the living room to be sorted through. "Don't get all mushy on me now, Bartowski, but I got you two a couple of housewarming gifts."

"More whiskey?" Chuck said, none too pleased with the idea after the hangover he'd suffered through.

Casey shook his head, and lead them back out to the Crown Vic, where he popped the trunk. Chuck rolled his eyes. "Of course. You got us guns."

"Springfield M1A for Walker, since they kept your old rifle for evidence," Casey said. "And a KSG-12 for you, Bartowski. Because Every man who has a daughter should also have a shotgun. To keep away undesirables."

"Which is all of them."

Casey grunted agreement, and Sarah rolled her eyes.

Nuevo Casa Bartowski

Tyson's Corner, VA

Oct 19, 2011

Chuck's prediction of cracking the encryption on Nathaniel Barnard's PDA quickly proved overly optimistic. After two days he was frustrated. After a week he was beside himself. After almost three weeks, Sarah resorted to drastic measures. "So," she asked. "What do you think we should be for Halloween?"

"Huh?" Chuck wasn't really listening, he and Jones had a new algorithm they were working on that might get them through the first layer of the encryption. It seemed Mr. Barnard was even more paranoid than Sarah. From the best they could gather, the man had quadruple encrypted his PDA data with 1mb keys. Standard decryption would take approximately 11 years. If there was anything important on there, they needed to know right away, not in 2022. He scribbled a note and then slapped the pen between his teeth in case he needed it later, while he typed the new code.

"So, which costume do you think?" Sarah said. "I think this Shanna the She-devil one is pretty nice, if a little revealing..."

"What?" Chuck finally turned, at mention of a comic book character, and his eyes popped open wide. The pen fell out of his mouth. "What are you wearing?"

"Finally the man notices," Sarah grinned. "I guess you like the loincloth?" She did a quick pirouette.

He just gaped at her with his mouth open. "I... have... work... to..." Chuck blinked. "What's the deal with you and costumes lately?"

"Are you complaining?" Sarah said. "Halloween is coming up, and since I kind of just sprang Supergirl on you last year, I thought I'd give you the chance to have input. I've got some other ones I can try on..."

"Yeah, about that..." Chuck said. "I already got it covered."

She raised an eyebrow. "Dare I ask?"

"Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman."

Sarah blinked, but then grinned. "It's a little on the nose, isn't it?"

"The only thing invisible here is your top."

"And skintight blue spandex is better?"

Chuck raised an eyebrow. "Maybe better isn't the word. Less likely to cause a riot."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "At least you're not hunched over the computer working anymore."

"Actually, I was taking a break. I've created a photo-mockup of Lisa in her costume."

"Awwww... Lisa gets a Fantastic Four outfit?" Sarah said, peering over his shoulder.

"Of course, she's part of the family," Chuck said. "Reed and Sue Richards have two kids, Franklin and Valeria."

"Okay, but who's going to be the other two? The Thing and The Human Torch? Why are you grinning at me like that?"

"You used to call them 'Orange Rock Guy', and 'That Guy Who Catches on Fire.' Your nerdiness is building up nicely."

"That's why you make me come with you to the comic shop," she said, a touch accusing. "You're trying to turn me into one of you!"

"And it's working. Are you or are you not wearing a Shanna the She-devil costume completely on your own hook?"

"Give me a sec," Sarah grinned and set to work briefly. "I am not."

"Hiyo!"

Chuck had begun to split his time between Quantico and Langley more equally, thanks to the leeway of reporting to his old college buddy Jesus Jones in S&T as his cover. It was a simpler operation with that change, and Chuck decided it had mostly been inertia that had sent him to the Iceland desk in the first place. Sarah's idea to disguise his CIA activities as something else was still a good one, and Jones and Manoosh kept him insulated from anyone who wasn't in on Operation Flypaper, the codeword now used for all Intersect operations. As far as anyone else was concerned, Chuck and Jones were working together on a largely arcane bit of quantum computational decryption algorhythms; while it was potentially very useful, immediate results weren't expected, and so, his time was less restricted. Without Gerald's constant hovering to deal with, the entire training operation worked more smoothly. In early November, the new Intersect was completed, so, with the computer doing a large portion of the Intel sifting Chuck had been forced to do before, they decided to test the new removal procedure, wiping the Intersect from Chuck's head completely. For those couple of days, with the skillset removed as well, Chuck foundered briefly, like a child with the training wheels off his bicycle, but he had a new sense of determination and he rebounded quickly. He threw himself into both his jobs, defeating the first layer of Barnard's encryption scheme and inching down his time on the runs he went with the recruits. He outpaced all but Kevin, whose Awesome running skills were likely genetic. He improved his shooting skills without the Intersect as well, again easily outstripping the recruits save Kevin. Sarah and Casey both managed to out-shoot Kevin with pistols, and Casey could do it with a rifle; Sarah was even with both out to six hundred yards, but beyond that they were the better marskmen. It wasn't by much, of course; at that level of skill, it was a matter of who had had the better night's sleep, or accidentally stubbed their toe coming out of the shower that morning, or a stray gust of wind, that decided matters on the range.

Chuck's self-imposed training regimen included self-defense, but sparring with Sarah, even Intersect-free, proved to be ill-advised. He could fend her off most of the time, and hold his own at least some of the time, though he couldn't bring himself to strike her. As Sarah had predicted back in Clarkdale months before, their 'sparring' generally became sensually charged, and rather than risk being caught in one of the maintenance closets a second time, (Kevin had suggested they hang a tie on the doorknob next time) they turned him over to Casey for that part of training.

After the week Intersect-free, Manoosh and the guys ironed out the last kinks and shoved the whole mess back into Chuck's skull. It was a strange occasion; Chuck had some misgivings about re-Intersecting himself, but he still had his own copy of Orion's removal procedure. He'd locked it away in a safety deposit box under one of the aliases Sarah had established for their escape from Burbank the year before. He was fairly certain that nobody had ever tumbled to his Elvis Markham identity.

This upload was different, not in any changes to the Intersect's data or skillset, it was pretty routine for Chuck, similar to the refreshers he'd gone through before. The difference lay in the fact that there was a team watching the readout of the FMRI they took of his brain during the upload, to determine a baseline for the others. The idea was that before they tried to upload the full package into anyone else, they would go over that data, attempting to discern the necessary limitations to put on the uploads for the recruits.

It was decided that Laura would recieve the same upload as Chuck, while the others would all have some parts of the package omitted. Kevin's Delta Force experience duplicated a fair number of the skills anyway, and from a safety perspective, he was the most likely to suffer some damage since he had the lowest score on the aptitude test, so his upload wasn't to include the entire database either. His time in training, Myers and Beckman decided, was something of a waste of time, and so when Kevin volunteered to be the first guinea pig, the week before Thanksgiving, they obliged him. Kevin recieved the second upload.

He was unconscious for nearly forty-eight hours, but seemed to be his old self after he awoke, ravenous despite the IV nutrients they'd been feeding him. Chuck kidded Kevin about the battery of tests they would now put him through, glad that someone else would now be under the same scrutiny. Even when the tests on Kevin came back clean, and the other three recruits' Intersect packages were ready for upload, Casey was adamant that Laura and Jarod and Danny weren't ready yet, and so, they held off on more uploads until Drill Instructor Casey was satisfied. Which probably wouldn't be for another couple of years, Casey was fond of saying in earshot of the recruits. As a motivational tactic, he said. Chuck wondered if Casey had the right definition of 'motivation'.

Nuevo Casa Bartowski

November 22, 2011

The doorbell rang, and Chuck was busy coding—he and Jones still hadn't beaten the next generation encryption on Barnard's PDA; it had four layers, and so far they'd only cracked two— so Sarah answered the door, Lisa on her hip and her hair unwashed, wearing a wrinkled pair of sweats and an old t-shirt with a baby-puke stain above the words 'Frak Off.' They'd given the recruits a whole three days off for the Thanksgiving holiday, and Sarah had been taking advantage of her time free of training responsibilities to laze around and play with her four-month old baby girl. Almost five months now, actually. Sarah was quite proud of her little bundle of joy; Lisa was a developmental wonder, according to the online guides Sarah was consulting. She was already trying, albeit unsuccessfully so far, to roll over, which some babies couldn't do until six or seven months. Sarah was beginning to be convinced her child would be a prodigy, although some of that was just wishful parenting, she knew. She blinked, and cringed inwardly when she took in the identity of their guests on the camera that overlooked the front door. Ellie and Devon were a day early, and she was a mess.

How they'd managed to finagle the extra time off from the hospital, Sarah had no idea, and she wasn't in a hurry to find out. There had likely been blood sacrifice involved, or at least some massive amount of bribery.

The door swung open and Sarah braced herself for Hurricane Ellie. It didn't happen immediately. There was a moment of shock first, Ellie taking in the whole momly picture of Sarah and seeming to wince slightly, before she spotted Lisa and her eyes widened. "Did you steal a second baby?"

"What no," Sarah said. "What are you talking about?"

"She's so fat!"

Sarah glared for a moment. "She's in the seventieth percentile for weight andheight and she's perfectly fine."

"I just— I din't mean fat in a bad way, I'm sorry, Sarah," Ellie said. "I'm just a little frazzled— from the flight and everything. She's grown, that's all."

"Babies will tend to do that, Babe," Devon said. "Where's Chuck?"

"Upstairs working," Sarah shrugged. "Come on in you guys. I can't believe I'm leaving you standing in the doorway, come in!" Now Hurricane Ellie descended, clapping Sarah in a patended strangle-hug, though she kept it brief in deference to Lisa's relative squashability.

"Can I hold her?" Ellie said.

Sarah grimaced. "Maybe not the best idea right now, Ellie," she said. "Lisa's been getting kind of weird lately. She screams every time I try to leave the room."

"Awww," Ellie said.

"Believe me, it gets old after a while. Although maybe you can distract her," Sarah held Lisa out to Ellie, but the baby girl clutched a handful of Sarah's shirt and began wailing immediately, refusing to be detached from her mother. Sarah let out a sigh and let Lisa go back to her spot in the crook of her mother's arm. She gave a one-shouldered shrug. "See what I mean?" Lisa began her second or third favorite activity, saying blah-blah-blah-blah, over and over. Sarah grinned down at her and mimicked her for a few seconds. Ellie grinned.

"So, what's the Chuckster working on?" Devon said.

Sarah raised an eyebrow. "Sorry, Devon. Classified."

Ellie shook her head. "My brother the spy," she said, frowning.
"He's in S&T," Sarah said. "Not a spy."

"Do what? What's that?" Ellie said.

"He transferred to Science & Technology," Sarah explained. "Kind of like the Nerd Herd, but with way better gadgets. Still, he can't tell you about it."

"What about you?" Ellie said. "I mean, I never thought you'd go full-time mommy like this. Don't you miss it?"

Sarah hid her surprise. "Am I that obvious?" she said, remembering at once and hating the subterfuge. Ellie and Devon still thought, along with Morgan, that Sarah had retired and Chuck was 'merely' an analyst. "I've been thinking about a spot as a training officer at the Farm." Like all good lies, there was a grain of truth to that.

"Can you tell me that?" Ellie said. "I mean..."

"It's a gray area," Sarah said, and then had to fend off Lisa's wandering hand. The littlest Bartowski had only recently discovered the joys of pulling on her mommy's hair, (which meant no more dangly earrings) and Sarah had to peel Lisa away like some kind of pudgy barnacle, which nearly brought on a new wave of wails, before Sarah brought the infant back close to her.

Ellie was fighting a grin and losing horribly at this point. Devon wasn't much better. "The house is great, Sarah. Do we get a tour?"

"Chuck will want to help with that," Sarah said. "Even though I didn't think you were getting in until Wednesday."

Once they'd torn Chuck away from his work, they started the tour upstairs. The guest bedroom and what was basically Chuck's man-cave (but was another bedroom according to the plans) shared a bathroom, with a loft area overlooking the front stairs. Downstairs there was the master bedroom and bath, with the nursery set up in the front bedroom, just off the entry hall. Ellie started talking with Sarah about the shade of paint in the master bath, and Chuck and Devon slipped off to grab a beer.

Devon was suitably impressed with Chuck's setup in the garage; they'd finally gotten most of the stuff with sentimental value shipped from the CIA warehouse it had gone to after the house in Clarkdale had eaten a helicopter. But there were risks in retrieving too much of their old belongings; it might be suspicious if the Ring had anyone privy to the warehouse's records. "So, do you actually know how to use any of these things?"

"The soldering iron and the screwdrivers, yes," Chuck said. "But you meant the weird antique corkscrew thingy?"

"Yeah what is that?"

"I think it's a drill. Sarah bought it on a whim from some place in Arizona," Chuck shrugged. "It gives the workbench character."

The door from the house cracked open and Sarah poked her head in. "There you two are," she said, "Come on, its time for the security briefing."

Devon raised an eyebrow. "Is that really necessary?"

"If you're staying with us you need to know how to set up the system, or you'll basically be a prisoner, so yeah."

"It's not that bad, Chuck," Sarah said.

"It's pretty bad. Bad-ass, that is," he quickly backpedaled when he caught the glint in her eye. Chuck followed Sarah and Ellie into the back hallway.

"Okay, Ellie, you first," Sarah had to hand off Lisa to Chuck.

"I thought Lisa didn't like leaving you?"

"We smell enough alike that she doesn't know the difference," Chuck said without thinking about it, until Sarah blushed faintly and Devon tried to fist-bump him. Then it was his turn to flush. "I just meant because we use the same soap and shampoo and stuff," he pointed an accusing finger at everyone. "You all need to get your minds out of the gutter."

Ellie shook her head. "I'm first at what, Sarah, you didn't explain."

"Give me your hand," Sarah grabbed her sister-in-law's wrist and tapped a quick code into the alarm panel. A small cubby opened in the wall to reveal a palm-scanner, and Sarah pressed Ellie's hand to it. A green bar of light came up and passed up and down over Ellie's hand, and then a chime sounded. The LED came up with the message.

New Hand-print Identified.

Sarah tapped more keys on the alarm pad and the readout flashed.

Ellie Woodcomb:

Guest Privileges Granted.

Length of Stay: 3 Days.

Please Record Voice Sample Now:

Ellie and Devon's eyebrows were both climbing.

'Just your name,' Sarah mouthed, and Ellie nodded, saying her name aloud.

Voice Sample Confirmed.

"Hardcore," Devon said. "What do guest privileges entail?"

"You can come and go, as you please," Sarah said, "and you can get into the Panic Room in an emergency, but you can't actually disable the security system. If we've got the system armed, you have to scan your handprint when you enter or leave the house. All the external doors have secondary electronic locks. Okay, Devon, your turn."

They repeated the process with the second Dr. Woodcomb, and then he grinned. "You guys have a panic room? What's that about? Sarah, I know you can take care of yourself."

"Come on, we'll show you," Chuck said, leading the way for the procession. He had to hand Lisa back to her mother. His skills at preemptive cry-stopping had abandoned him recently. The back hallway wrapped around the open kitchen and dining room to a framed picture on the wall, of Chuck and Sarah at their wedding. Ellie rolled her eyes again to see Chuck in his Han Solo getup and Sarah in full-on sci-fi space armor as Leia in her disguise as Boussh the bounty hunter, helmet held under her arm. Vader was standing by to give away the bride and Chewbacca was serving as Chuck's best man.

"Hey," Chuck said, when he caught his sister's disgruntled expression. "At least its not the slave-Leia costume again. I mean, you've still got that someplace, right Sarah?"

"Among others," Ellie grimaced at that revelation and Sarah shrugged sheepishly.

"TMI you two," Ellie said.

"Sorry," Chuck said and swung the photo aside to reveal another hand-scanner. "Okay, your guest privileges don't normally cover getting in here, but if the alarm gets tripped, then, you just put your hand on here," Chuck did so as he spoke, "and viola."

A section of wall retracted with a familiar hiss, and Ellie glared at him suspiciously. It wasn't exactly like the doors from Star Trek, but it was close enough. The door slid up out of the way to reveal a metal pole and a hole in the floor. Chuck grabbed on and slid down out of sight. Devon boomed a laugh and slid down after Chuck.

Ellie turned on Sarah. "You've got to be kidding me. You let him put a fireman's pole in the house? You know you're supposed to be the one in charge, right? Now Devon's going to want one."

Sarah frowned. "What do you mean? It's the most efficient way. We could have gone with a slide like the base under the Buy More had, but-"

"You had a secret base under the Buy More?" Ellie gaped at her. "With a slide?"

"Didn't we tell you about that?" Sarah shrugged. "Yeah, the CIA put it in when the place had to get 'fumigated' a few years back."

Ellie shook her head and then frowned from the metal pole to Sarah and Lisa in her arms. "Is there another way in? It can't be safe for you to slide down that with Lisa, can it?"

Sarah nodded. "Yeah, hang on," she reached over to a panel on the wall in the alcove and hit a couple of buttons. After a few seconds, there was a swish of pneumatic piping and a metal plate slid into place in the hole. "That's how you get out, too," Sarah explained stepping onto the disc of metal. Another button press and she was lowered gently.

"How do I get the elevator back up?" Ellie said.

"What, too prim to slide down a pole?" Sarah called back. Ellie heard Chuck coughing a moment later and blushed. Chuck yelped a second after that, and Sarah's voice wafted up to Ellie again. "Who's got their mind in the gutter now, buster?" Sarah sent the elevator disc back up, and there was no more mention of pole-sliding.

There was a pair of cots folded along one wall as well as a spare crib for Lisa, and a bank of computer monitors along the other wall. A walk-in closet at the back held shelves full of MREs and a chemical toilet. Chuck demonstrated the panic room functions for Ellie and Devon. There was a second nearly six-inch thick vault door that closed off the panic room from the small entry alcove with the firehouse pole.

Though there was little chance they'd ever be forced to call on the room for its original intended function, as fallout shelter, it was nice to know they had it. And for once, it was nice to be the one who had total control over the cameras. They mostly covered the exterior of the house, and just the living room and the upstairs den-so Chuck could spy on the places he expected to have trouble with handsy teenagers in the years to come, and make sure they really were 'just studying'. Devon was looking at all the equipment enviously once Chuck explained the nosy-dad part of the equation, and Chuck raised an eyebrow at Ellie.

"Yeah," she said, looking fondly at Lisa. "Us too."

"Congratulations!" Sarah said. "I mean, it is congratulations, right? I thought you were waiting until next year at least. Or did you mean 'us too,' as in birth control-mishap?" She grimaced at Chuck apologetically for her over-curiosity about Ellie and Devon's baby-making situation.

Ellie shook her head. "No. No mishaps, just... we crunched the numbers again. It's time."

Devon grinned and wrapped an arm around his wife's shoulders, beaming. It was a far cry from the spit-take he'd done when Ellie had teased him about being pregnant a few months ago upon Chuck and Sarah's return to LA.

"They're a lot of work," Sarah said, hefting her daughter. She wrinkled her nose. "And also sometimes stink-messy. But they're worth it. Dirty diapies and all."

"Oh, can I change her?" Ellie said. "I need to get in some practice."

Sarah's eyes widened. "Are you serious? Of course you can changer her!" She shared a brief glance with Chuck, who looked just as overjoyed as she to be out of the diaper changing business for a while. "How long can you stay before they need you back at the hospital?"

TO BE CONTINUED...

A/N: Hopefully I'll still get the next chapter out on Friday as scheduled, but if not I'll see you Monday. Thanks to everybody who reviewed the last chapter, please kept them coming. They are the fuel that makes the story engine go. Or maybe the oil? Actually wait. They're the fuel injector. This metaphor is officially getting away from me.