A/N Here is Chapter 20. I will also be posting Chapter 21 more or less simultaneously. I am in the midst of end-of-the-term grading. It may be the middle of next week before the next chapter. Thanks for reading, reviewing and PMing. As they say in my neck of the woods, ya'll good folks.

Careful, the timeline jumps around here. And Sarah's Porsche is not a Delorean.

Don't Own Chuck.

CHAPTER 20 Hard Rime

The seed is not afraid

Of winter...

Thomas Merton, Cables to the Ace 54

Morgan missed Chuck. He had seen him that morning at the Buy More. Chuck had worked a short shift before leaving with Sarah. They'd walked off in the direction of the Orange Orange.

When Morgan went to look for them there—thinking maybe a little froyo for an early lunch?—they weren't in the shop. The two new employees who worked for Sarah were inside polishing chrome surfaces—but no Chuck, no Sarah.

Morgan wasn't entirely sure how Sarah had gone from wieners to yogurt, where Scooter had gone, how it had all happened so suddenly, but he had to admit: things happened around Sarah Walker.

He wondered what had happened on the week they were out of town. They'd been back a week, and although it was clear they felt the same way about each other, maybe even felt more of the same way, they still didn't seem quite right to Morgan. Their there wasn't there. Morgan paused over that thought, not sure he understood it though it was his.

Well, he'd keep his eyes open. Maybe he'd figure out a way to help them. He'd been jealous of Sarah, but he also knew what a difference she had made in Chuck. Morgan wanted Chuck always to be his best friend. But he wanted Chuck to be his best even more. Chuck had so much promise. Sarah was turning him into a promise-keeper at long last. How could Morgan not be happy about that, and happy for them? He was.

In the week since Chuck had been back, Chuck had not had much time for Morgan. When Chuck was at work, he was either out on installs or he was elbows-deep in some repair in the Chuck Pen. Nothing had been repaired during the week Chuck was gone, and Morgan had to admit the Pen had started to look a little like the garbage compactor in Star Wars. Morgan was a half afraid that Jeff might be down there under all those parts and pieces, swimming around, lurking…

Chuck and Sarah left Ellie's lab together. They'd stayed after the Intersect download and had lunch with her in the hospital cafeteria. They wanted to spend more time with her; she wanted to keep an eye on Chuck a little longer.

They got into Sarah's Porsche to head back to the Buy More and the Orange Orange. Chuck knew he had her second letter in his bag to read. Sarah seemed nervous. Chuck thought it was not about the letters. Giving them to Chuck seemed to make her happy, even if her happiness was apprehensive, even if she worried that maybe each letter would end hem.

No, something else was on he mind.

"So…Chuck. This morning I ran into Bryce at my apartment building. Turns out he lives there too, and on the same floor. Next door." She stared straight ahead at the road, her arms and shoulders tense.

Chuck sat silent. "Now, that is a coincidence." His tone contradicted what he said.

"Chuck, we both know it isn't. Bryce came to town expected to take up with me again, obviously. That didn't work out for him. He does not know it but I am taken. He does know that there I am not interested. In fact, he seemed embarrassed to be living there, given how things stand."

"The worst part of him being there is that we can't be together there, or, if we are, it will have to be logged as cover maintenance—and so Bryce will need to hear nothing from the apartment that is not consistent with us cover dating."

"So we can't let him hear my girlish screams?" Chuck's question cleared the air and made Sarah grin lopsidedly.

"Look, Chuck, you know I want to…But it isn't going to be easy. I'm worried about Bryce looking over Casey's shoulder where your surveillance is concerned. We could rent a hotel room under an assumed name—but I'd rather that be something we do because we think it would be fun, fantasy, not because we have to, necessity. Although I may be forced to just drag you someplace…"

"Sarah, I understand that you want us to be together. I understand that it will be complicated right now to find a place where we can relax and be together. I also understand, more importantly, that you really aren't ready for that, yet, even though you want it. It's ok, Sarah. It really is."

"But you don't want to go back to before Tahoe."

"No, but as long as I know we are together, I can live for a while not being together. I know the letters matter to everything between us. You are what is most important. I will wait."

"Thank you, Chuck." Sarah grabbed his hand and squeezed it hard.

Beckman was actually beginning to worry about Graham. At their last two briefings, he had seemed off, way off.

He had seemed off for a while, admittedly, but Beckman at first thought that was because of everything with Marge. Maybe this was too. She didn't know. All she knew was that he seemed to have trouble completing thoughts, and that he mumbled to himself in the middle of briefings, and that he was rubbing his forehead or his temples constantly. He was no longer really making an effort to hide his hatred of Bartowski. It oozed out of his gaze and darkened every word about Bartowski he said.

Beckman was worried that sending Chuck after Hilda Byrne was Graham's way of putting Bartowski down. Beckman had been able to ensure that the entire team would be involved. But she had no way of making sure that Bartowski would leave that hotel room alive. She'd have to hope that Bartowski was as resourceful as she thought, Walker as capable.

Hilda Byrne was a cold-school killer, full stop. She was Walker before Walker met Bartowski.

By the time they got to the Porsche after Bryce's Hilda Byrne briefing, Sarah's eyes had frosted over again, a hard rime.

Chuck could not tell if she was mad at him, mad at Casey, mad at Bryce, mad at some subset of that group, mad at the entire situation, or maybe mad at the worldhood of the world. She slammed her door when she got in. Chuck got in too and immediately buckled up, though she had yet to start the car. Didn't matter. He felt endangered.

She sat in her seat for a minute. She hit the steering wheel hard with both hands. "Damn it!"

"Uh, Sarah," Chuck began gently, "I'm sorry about staring at that picture."

"Chuck, that isn't the problem. Well, I admit, it's a little bit of the problem. But most of the problem is this damn mission. What are Graham and Bryce thinking? They're going to get you killed. That woman is dangerous. And making you seduce her? Take off 'enough' of her clothes?" Sarah actually made scare-quotes in the air with her index fingers. "What the…? Damn!" She struck the steering wheel again. Chuck hurt for it.

"Sarah, I'm sorry…but I don't exactly understand. Are you worried about her killing me or about me maybe…seeing her naked or nearly naked."

Sarah did not look at him, but she dropped her chin to her chest. "Both," she said in a small voice.

"But, Sarah, I've seen a picture of her in that bikini. There's not much more of her to see."

Sarah looked at him like he had lost his mind. "That's a little like someone walking up to a wet spot on the ground in Yellowstone, looking at it, and turning away, saying, 'Well, I've seen Old Faithful, might as well go, not much more to see.'"

Chuck tried to keep from laughing. "Yeah, ok, I get it. I get that. Although that was a strangely specific National Park illustration."

"I've been places, Chuck."

"Right."

"Anyway, as I would expect you to know, there's a big difference between seeing pictures of flesh and being with someone in the flesh."

"Sarah, you know you are the only woman for me."

"That's just it, Chuck, since Tahoe I haven't been the woman for you. The thought that…that woman will have you in her room, intending to sleep with you, trying to make that happen, that would make me crazy regardless…But when you add in that we have been…apart for a while…"

"Well, she might just kill me before anything happens."

"Right, because the thought of that makes everything better." Then Sarah flashed Chuck a quick, cruel grin. "No, now that I consider it, the thought of that does make things a little better."

"For a woman of such beauty, Sarah Walker, you can be seriously jealous."

"For a man of such intelligence, Chuck Bartowski, you can be seriously clueless. C'mon. Let's go train. Then I will give you some pointers on seducing a woman."

Chuck was crestfallen. "You mean I don't know how to…do that?"

Sarah gave away just a hint of a grin. "I will give you some pointers on seducing another woman."

Chuck looked puzzled. "Did what you just said make things worse for me or better?"

Sarah started the car and maneuvered into traffic without any answer.

They drove to the martial arts studio Sarah had been frequenting since she came to Burbank. There was now a gym in Castle, but it was too small, to open to Bryce and Casey, too many cameras. Their first plan for training had not worked. This would be good. Sarah hadn't started with this studio because, although she liked the owner a lot, the owner was a little too observant and a little too wily for Sarah to feel comfortable bringing Chuck. The owner noticed things.

Chuck grabbed his gym bag from the backseat. He had put it in the car on the way in this morning since Sarah had picked him up. Sarah's was beside his, so he grabbed it for her. Together, they went in. Chuck, as usual when visiting any new place, was all eyes and ears, drinking it in. Sarah watched him look around.

A small, attractive young woman met them at the desk.

"Sarah!"

"Hey, Alex!"

Alex took a long, appraising look at Chuck, who grinned at her. "So, I'm guessing this is the much-ballyhooed Chuck Bartowski?"

Sarah had forgotten how direct the small auburn-haired woman was. Sarah blushed a deep red. "Um, yes."

Alex stepped around the counter and right up to Chuck. She grabbed him and hugged him, a hug somehow too big for the small woman who gave it. "I'm so glad to meet the man who makes this woman smile. She can't say your name without lighting up."

Chuck was taken aback by the welcome but pleased by it too. In Bartowski fashion, he returned the hug eagerly.

"I'm Alex McHugh. So, Sarah finally got you to train with her, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess so. We've been training a little at the YMCA near my place, but it's crowded—and Sarah in workout wear only makes it more crowded." It was true. They had thought it might be a decent place to train, anonymous—and it was, for Chuck. Not for Sarah. She attracted an audience each time they went in.

"So I can imagine. Well, you two can use the private space in the back. The men's locker room is over there, Chuck," Alex said, pointing.

Alex walked with Sarah to the women's locker room after stationing one of her employees at the front counter. She stood thoughtfully as Sarah began to change. "He's great, Sarah. I get it. Does he have a friend?" Sarah pulled her shoe on and began to lace it. "Well, Sarah, does he?"

Chuck was already making strides in hand-to-hand combat. He could not yet spar at all seriously with Sarah, but he was not so far from it. Another week, maybe two, and she would sweat from the intensity of effort and not just from the prolonged effort.

He was at a point where Sarah thought he could hold his own against a garden-variety assailant. Not against Hilda, not close. And he could not hold his own against anyone for long. Chuck's combat stamina was still not close to where Sarah wanted it to be. But Chuck had run with her a couple of times during the week since they got back—in fact, one of the attractions of the YMCA was that there was a track there and that they could run to the YMCA and from it. He was able to spar at a decent speed for longer each time.

They finished and went to their separate showers. They met in the front and chatted for a minute with Alex. Sarah invited Alex to visit her at the Orange Orange.

When they got back in the car, Chuck asked Sarah where they were going to go to work on his seduction training. Sarah gaped at him.

"I was kidding, Chuck." She frowned. "I'm unhappy about this mission but you will be fine. I will not let anything happen…or happen to you. Don't let Bryce and Casey get to you. Casey was teasing me too, you know. Maybe me more than you, though he looked at you for Bryce's benefit.

"Relax, Chuck, you are charming, and even more charming because you don't believe it and aren't trying. Just be you. She'll respond. I did."

"Yeah, Sarah, but that woman is a hired killer."

"So am I, Chuck." The blue of Sarah's eyes darkened. She grabbed her bag and handed him her third letter.

Sarah dropped Chuck at his house. She would pick him up in the morning. They both worked morning shifts. And then there was the Hilda mission after that. Chuck unlocked the apartment and went inside. Neither Ellie nor Devon was home. He sat down carefully on the couch and got Sarah's letter from his bag.

In her letters, she wasn't telling him about everything she had done in the CIA. She was hitting the high, or rather, the low, points.

The memories that she did not want to remember and had chosen not to remember.

The memories she had given to her cover identities.

The memories that were in between them.

The memories keeping them in between Tahoe and Reno.

The memories keeping them from being together while they were together apart.

The first two letters had not been pleasant reading. From the first to the second, he could feel the Sarah of the past becoming increasingly distanced from herself, feel her growing, unacknowledged misery.

Reading the letters was not a happy experience. However, Chuck was happy about the fact of the letters. Sarah was confessing to him; she trusted him. She trusted him with something so hurtful she had not trusted herself with it.

He trusted her with the Piranha and with his future. She trusted him with Agent Walker and her past.

He opened the envelope, unfolded the stationary pages and began to read: