Ch. 12 The Hunt for Red October

A/N: I shuffled some parts around to even out the chapter length, with the added bonus of having Emma and Molly torture Sarah in this chapter instead of waiting for the next installment.

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Carina entered the room, uniquely able to appear to be sauntering and moving quickly. "Alright, Chuckie, why don't you show me what has Walker here all hot and bothered," she said while blatantly checking him out from head to toe and ending with a wind.

"Ex-excuse me?" Chuck stammered out, clearly uncomfortable with both Carina's comment and her overt ogling.

"Carina," Sarah managed to growl out from between tightly clenched teeth.

"Relax, Sarah. I was just talking about his computer skills," Carina replied with her most practiced innocent look. Sarah didn't buy it for a second. "I'm calling in my first marker for a Piranha hack-that Venezuelan general." Turning to the fourth person in the room, Carina called out, "Hiya, Roan."

With a suave dip of the head that Chuck desperately wished he could emulate, Roan smiled demurely, "Agent Miller, I see that you have perfected your shock and awe approach. Impressive."

Carina returned the dip of the head, making Chuck wonder if he was the only one in the room without the debonair gene. Carina then spun to focus on Sarah, and unspoken question floating between them.

"It's okay," Sarah responded to the silent inquiry. She was still upset with herself for taking Carina's bait with the flirting towards Chuck. But he was her guy, and no one was going to threaten that. "Roan met with Casey and Beckman. He wanted the chance to see Chuck's computer skills first hand."

"Fair enough," Carina said, completely businesslike now that she knew that she was getting what she needed. "I've received word that my Venezuelan General Ramirez is going to be sending a large shipment within the next day or two. But still nothing on how, what or where. But Ramirez has a lot on this line with this shipment. We bust this one and his house of cards collapses."

Chuck reviewed the notes from the prior discussion with Carina. He soaked in all of the biographical data that she had on the Venezuelan general, as well as what he could glean online. He then fired up his computer and got to work.

"While I can handle a basic conversation in Spanish, these communications will be a far cry from interpreting the menu of the local Mexican restaurant," Chuck said while giving Sarah a quick eyebrow dance. Carina's eyes bulged as Sarah revealed a slight, but genuine, blush. "But these communications will be far from ordinary. Plus, the same word used in LA might mean something totally different in Caracas. For that matter, the slang in Caracas might be completely different from the slang in El Dorado."

Sarah rested a hand on Chuck's shoulder, "Don't worry about that part. You get us in, I can handle the translations."

Chuck turned to look at her, his visage a combination of respect, awe and love. Sarah shifted her hand from his shoulder to run her fingers through the curls on the back of his head, completely tuning out the presence of Roan and Carina.

"So far gone," Carina mumbled to Roan, looking at her friend as if Sarah had just grown a second head.

"Yes, indeed he is," Roan responded, equally quietly. Carina spun to look at Roan before turning her attention to the curly haired nerd doing his thing on the computer. A moment later she nodded her head in concurrence.

Chuck finally broke eye contact with Sarah and focused on the monitor. "Okay, let's see what we've got here. Interesting. Very interesting. In addition to his official email, General Ramirez has emails from a different address stored on an encrypted folder on his desktop."

Chuck's fingers flew across the keyboard, a blur of activity that was too fast to follow with the eye. He would pause from time to time, often accompanied by incoherent grumbling, before resuming his furious typing. "Okay, Sarah. I've copied and downloaded all of the emails onto a secure cloud server based in the Seychelles. Just in case anyone else goes looking for breadcrumbs. We can now take our time looking over the emails to see what is there. I'll put them up on this monitor as they are decrypted. In the meantime, I'll just tweak the logs on the Venezuelan military server to make it look as though no one was ever here."

"Damn, Bartowski," Carina said as she let out a low whistle. "Got into a government system, located and decrypted all of these emails that fast? I'm starting to see why Walker here is getting all hot and bothered by those fingers of yours. Maybe I should find myself a geek to play with."

"Nerd," Sarah automatically, and sternly, responded. She kept her eyes focused on the emails displayed before her.

"Hmm," Carina said, looking quite like the cat that ate the canary. "I noticed that you corrected me on the part about the geek and not the part about being all hot and bothered."

Sarah froze momentarily before responding, "Let's keep our eyes on the prize here Carina."

"Oh, I am," Carina gleefully answered, while nodding to the emails on the screen. "You just keep your eyes on the emails and not your 'prize'." Chuck's ears turned a vibrant red as he logged into a different computer system.

A minute later, Sarah broke the silence. "Here we go. The package to be delivered to the kilo today at 13:30 hours. That's odd," she muttered almost to herself. "The message clearly states 'the', so kilo is being used as an object not as a measurement."

Silence descended over the room as each person thought through the linguistic puzzle. "Just spitballing here, but didn't the Soviet Union have a class of submarines referred to as Kilos?"

"Pray tell, Mr. Bartowski," Roan inquired, "how is it that you are familiar with Soviet era submarines?" The question was asked without animosity, merely curiosity.

"'Hunt for Red October'," Chuck replied. "Loved the movie, loved the book even more. When we were kids, Morgan found an old text based video game at a yard sale. The graphics were pretty rudimentary, but good for those days. Can't even begin to guess how many hours we spent playing that one. Of course, it would have been cooler in Jonesey had been kicked out of Stanford rather than CalTech, but it was still cool."

Sarah didn't even try to hide her proud grin as she looked at Chuck. Such a brilliant mind with such an unassuming personality. Something about him rendered her spy shields useless. He is, she thought privately, like my own kryptonite. I'm powerless against him. Except that Superman hated kryptonite, while I can't get enough of Chuck.

Roan and Carina both shared a surprised look at this brilliant burst of insight. While Chuck came across as retiring, he was incredibly skilled with computers, and a bona fide genius to boot. No wonder why Diane is so eager to get him on board, Roan concluded. If she knew half as much as what I've just witnessed, she be thrilled with what he can contribute, even on a part time basis. But Roan also knew that the intelligence game was a meat grinder. With Chuck's inherent good nature, he would be destroyed by the system, while being manipulated into compromising his ideals at every turn. But his good nature, affability, and willingness to risk himself to save the sick and elderly made Roan and Carina fall victim to the same siren song as Sarah of the need to protect Chuck Bartowski.

"So, Mr. Bartowski, given your extensive…videogame research into the platform, what is the displacement and the size of a skeleton crew for the Kilo class submarine? If you do not have the information on hand, if you would be so kind as to use your prodigious computer skills to look it up? I believe that everyone here will acknowledge your superiority in that area," Roan requested deferentially.

"I don't think of it as superiority," Chuck mumbled as he set to the task assigned.

"Good God," Roan exclaimed privately to Carina. "The man can't even do false modesty. He wouldn't last a second in the field." He turned to look at Sarah, who had been discretely listening in the whole time. "You need to see to it Agent…Ms. Walker, that any agreement with the NSA is strictly kept as a consultant-analyst. Keep him out of the field."

Realizing that Chuck, too, had started listening in, Roan spoke to him, "Don't be offended Charles. Your skills with a computer are beyond impressive. But computer skills do not a field agent make." Roan then tilted his head to the side while considering Chuck, stating sardonically, "How is it that you can waltz through Venezuelan military security in the blink of an eye, but public domain information takes you this long?"

Chuck momentarily bristled at the dismissive tone from Agent Montgomery. Sarah had convinced Roan to help with the NSA, and Chuck was convinced that with anything remotely connected to the world of espionage, he would defer to Sarah. Unless her safety was on the line. There was no way that he would stay in a proverbial car if she were in danger.

"I had that information a while ago," Chuck calmly replied. "I've been going through the records of the Venezuelan military to find out if their Navy bought any old Russian subs, and, if so, the designation. If it's a Kilo, it's either Russian or Soviet, and there's a good chance that the Navy has it's acoustic signature in their database. That would mean that we could use the Navy's SOSUS system to try to locate her." Given the way that Sarah started running her fingers through the curls on the back of his head as he explained his activity in a cool, professional tone, he figured that she approved. Given the way that Sarah continued to run her fingers through the curls on the back of his head, Chuck became momentarily distracted and lost sight of what he was doing.

"Ahem," Carina said loudly after noticing the cursor idly blinking in the same spot for a bit. Sarah and Chuck both jumped a bit, each startled from their own private thoughts about Sarah's fixation with Chuck's curls. "If we could focus on the task at hand, rather than what Walker's hands are doing to your head, I've got a sub to catch."

"So," Roan jumped in before Carina could make a risqué comment about Chuck's head and Sarah's hands, "assuming that our suppositions are correct, what are odds that the sub (a) bears the flag of Venezuela in order to prevent a boarding-which would be seen as an act of war by an imperial aggressor, and all that malarkey Agent Miller; or, (b) has no marking for plausible deniability if it were to be caught smuggling narcotics?"

"Couldn't the Coast Guard board the vessel for a general health and safety check?" Chuck jumped in.

Roan turned to him with an impressed expression. "Very good, Charles. But for the Coast Guard to do a health and safety check, the submarine would need to be within three nautical miles of the US coast. A yacht or sport fishing boat could venture out well beyond such a range. And the sub could make several such drops in order to minimize the chance of the full load being captured."

"Stopping one drop of drugs is meaningless," Carina snarled. "Oh, don't go all Boy Scout on me Bartowski. I need to stop Ramirez. I get him, we stop dozens or even hundreds of such shipments."

While Chuck still took issue with stopping a drop as being 'meaningless', he recognized that there was a bigger picture at play. He also recognized that this ad hoc team he was on needed for him to pinpoint the location of the sub. Realizing this, he set to work.

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Sarah shuffled into her mother's house, still bleary-eyed from the very late night session of watching Chuck sit at a computer console and access information and resources that ought not to be accessible to a civilian. It shouldn't have been possible for him sitting at a desk in Echo Park to be able to pinpoint the location of a Soviet era submarine under the command of a drug smuggler masquerading as a Venezuelan military leader.

But Chuck had done just that. He had traced the sale of the sub to identify its designation, hacked into Pentagon archives to find its acoustic signature, then ran that through the SOSUS net. He had located the sub creeping around the western tip of Cuba. Through the encrypted messages to and from Ramirez, he had determined that the sub was headed to meet a small freighter near the port of Corpus Christi, Texas. The freighter was in bound from Baltimore, Maryland, so it wouldn't go through a rigorous customs check on its cargo.

Sarah thought back to the events of the previous evening. Carina had made a videoconference call (with Chuck disguising the point of origin of the conference) with her supervisors at the DEA. She had then dashed off to Bob Hope Airport to catch a DEA jet which would take her to a Coast Guard helicopter waiting for her in Fort Worth, Texas to get her to Corpus Christi. She would personally oversee the takedown. If successful, lots of people would share in the credit- just not Chuck. And he was fine with that.

Thanks to the information that Chuck had supplied Carina, the US Navy had dispatched the hunter/killer submarine USS Arkansas under the command of Cpt. Matt Johnstone to follow the Kilo sub once it cleared Cuban waters. The Navy was blissfully unaware that its own system had been largely responsible for Chuck being able to pinpoint the sub's location. Their focus was on the fact that a foreign country was trying to invade US waters. Captain Johnstone had privately been given authority to sink the sub if there was any indication that the DEA was wrong about its role to smuggle drugs.

Shortly after Carina had fled the scene, Roan too made his farewells. He had given Sarah a brief nod, "A pleasure as always Ms. Walker." Roan had then turned to Chuck to shake his hand, "Well done, Charles. Well done."

Sarah had walked Roan to the empty courtyard outside of Chuck's apartment. He paused by the quietly bubbling fountain, giving a nod in the direction of Chuck's window. "That is a rather extraordinary young man you have there, Sarah. And he also happens to be quite good with computers. What do you say you and I make sure that he stays safe, hmm?" He had then disappeared through the archway.

By the time all was said and done, Sarah was too tired to go back to her room at Maison 23. She had walked back into Chuck's bedroom, pulled a pair of boxers and a t-shirt with the graphic of a floppy disk reading My Entire Life before turning to go to the bathroom to change.

As she got to the door, Chuck called out in a teasing tone, "What? You're not going to even ask my permission to borrow my clothes?"

Sarah didn't break stride, calling back over her shoulder as she departed, "Nope" while popping the p sound at the end. She could see the start of a huge grin spreading across Chuck's face. As she went to close the door to the bathroom behind her, she added, "And who said anything about borrowing?" Closing the bathroom door, she caught sight of her own reflection in the mirror and was pleased to see a grin just as large as the one on Chuck's face. Maybe bigger. She thought back to what Carina had whispered to Roan. Yep, I am done. And I couldn't be happier about it.

Although she would have been far happier staying snuggled deep under the covers with Chuck, Sarah had gotten up just a few hours later to head back to her mom's house. When she had woken up, the pull to stay in bed with Chuck had been nearly overwhelming in its intensity, and was shocking that it was there at all. Despite her dalliances with Bryce and a handful of other men over the years, Sarah had made a strict rule of sleeping alone. As an agent, she was vulnerable when asleep-even with the CIA training on how to prepare for any threat even when asleep.

But there hadn't been any hesitation in deciding to stay the night with Chuck. It felt like the most natural choice. Chuck had fallen asleep quickly, exhausted from the events of the hunt for the Venezuelan submarine. Sarah had watched him slumber for a minute or two before she too fell asleep, more content than she could ever remember being.

But now, in her mother's kitchen, she was wishing that she was back in Chuck's bedroom in Echo Park. She discovered that she profoundly regretted not getting to experience waking up along with Chuck, wrapped in each other's arms. She had slid out of his embrace without waking him. She found herself daydreaming about what it would have been like to start the day with Chuck.

As Emma made her way down the stairs, she saw her older daughter seated at the breakfast nook with a grin from ear to ear. With a raised eyebrow, Emma took in Sarah's appearance: tousled hair, rumpled clothes that appeared to have been yesterday's wardrobe. Not speaking, Emma crossed the kitchen to pull a mug from the cabinet to get herself some morning coffee.

Over the rim of her mug of coffee, Emma made eye contact with Sarah, but stayed silent. Sarah narrowed her eyes in response, suspicious as to what her mom was up to. Emma then placed her mug on the table before picking up her cellphone and making a production out of scrolling through her contacts.

After a few moments of silence, Sarah caved. Her mother was up to something, but Sarah had no clue as to what it was. "Something that I can help you with there, Mom?"

Emma kept an innocent expression on her face, "No, dear. I'm just looking for a number."

Still lost as to what her mother's game was, but sure that a game was afoot, Sarah continued, "Whose number would that be?"

Emma paused for a moment, as if she were actually deliberating. Sarah reached for her cup of coffee, raising it to her lips. Perfect. "The minister's. I want to see if there is going to be any wait to book the church for your wedding."

Coffee sprayed from Sarah's mouth in shock over her mother's pronouncement. "We-wed-wedding?" She asked in a much louder voice than intended. Emma had to reach back to grab a hold of the countertop from laughing so hard.

Just then Molly popped around the corner, "Who's getting married?" Sarah's mouth kept opening and closing with no sound coming out. Emma had to wipe away tears, she was laughing so hard.

"No one, dear. Though your timing was impeccable. I was just teasing your sister."

Sarah was starting to recover, and attempted to glower at her mother although her heart wasn't in it.

"Ooh," Molly called out excitedly, "is it to Chuck? That would be sooo awesome. He would be my brother. And-and -and Ellie would be our sister!" By now Molly was bouncing in place with excitement, her pigtails flying through the air. "We'd be one big family. And we could do birthdays, and Thanksgiving and Christmas together!"

By now both Sarah and Emma were staring slack jawed at the little girl's enthusiasm. Emma was faster than Sarah to recover, "I take it that you would approve of the union, then?"

Molly looked confused at "union".

"Wedding. You would like to see Chuck and Sarah get married?" Emma asked through giggles.

"Yes, yes, yes!" Molly danced about the kitchen again, hands in the air in celebration.

Emma rounded on Sarah. "Don't freak out."

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Sarah was still feeling rattled hours later when she and Chuck met up again. He brought up the breaking news on his tablet about the DEA-Navy seizure of a former Russian submarine that was filled with tons of cocaine, heroin and methamphetamine. The speculation was that the sub belonged to Venezuela-which denied it as imperial propaganda aimed at overthrowing the people's government.

There had been international outrage, as General Ramirez hadn't ordered the removal of the torpedoes from the launch tubes before using the sub to enter US territorial waters to meet with the freighter. There had been domestic outrage in Venezuela over their loss of such an important, and expensive, military platform. There had been less public outrage among the drug cartels over the loss of a massive shipment, as well as the lost opportunity to use the sub for future smuggling operations.

Sarah looked up from the story at Chuck, "The hero again. This time you know, I know, Carina knows and Roan knows. Unfortunately, your sister and the American people still can't know." She affected a look of deep thought, "I'll have to make your anonymous hero status up to you somehow." She grabbed his wrist, yanking him towards his bedroom.

"Who's your mommaaaaa…" Chuck called out before the door to his bedroom slammed shut.

Two hours later when they decided to take a break, Chuck tried to tease Sarah, "What would your mother say?"

"Oh, she already offered to call the minister for us," Sarah replied with a straight face, neglecting to tell Chuck about her own reaction to her mother's comments.

Chuck proceeded to fall out of the bed and onto the floor. Red faced with embarrassment in the face of Sarah's giggling fit, Chuck asked, "Wait. Is your mom a fan of White Christmas?"

Sarah looked at Chuck as though he had grown a second head, "What does Christmas have to do with this?"

"You know, the movie? Bing Crosby and Danny Kaye dancing and singing in the Christmas classic? White Christmas. Ellie and I watch it every year. A Bartowski Christmas tradition. Well, that and the Twilight Zone marathon, but you're not ready for The Zone yet."

"You've lost me," Sarah admitted. She'd heard of Bing Crosby, but as far as she knew a white Christmas involved snow-not something to be found in Southern California.

"Ok, we are going to have to watch that. And soon. It's a Christmas (duh) musical movie," Chuck said, getting visibly excited over the prospect. "It's just you don't hear 'minister' used that often anymore. One of the songs in White Christmas is 'Mandy', which talks about having a minister handy."

Chuck closed his eyes and began singing acapella, "Mandy there's a minister handy. And it sure would be dandy, if we'd let him make a fee. So don't you linger, here's the ring for your finger, isn't it a humdinger. Come along and let the wedding chimes bring happy times for Mandy and me." Chuck's rich baritone filled his bedroom as Sarah's jaw dropped open. Damn if that's not sexy. And those lyrics are giving me thoughts that I shouldn't be having. She wanted to hear him sing more, lots more- even if it was about rings and weddings. But later. Much later.

Chuck opened his eyes and looked at Sarah curiously, "Why are you looking at me like..." Sarah proceeded to yank the bedsheet over both of their heads. "Who's your mmph"

Chuck realized quickly that now was not the time for talking. Lips were better used for things like kissing...

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A/N2: Sorry Joe Watkins, I understand that you and David maybe debating the greatest Christmas movie of all time, but hands down it's White Christmas. Bing Crosby, Danny Kaye, George Clooney's aunt.