A/N: We continue our tale. Monday of Chuck's Spring Break is about to end.

Jeux Sans Frontières

Chapter Eight: Fool's Mate

By the time Chuck and Charlie had made it back on the porch, Lou and Delta were there, armed with pie and coffee.

Charlie gestured to one of the chairs.

As Chuck sat down and Lou handed him a piece of pie, Charlie repeated his earlier question.

"Do you play chess, Chuck?"

Chuck shook his head at himself, taking the pie. "Sorry, Charlie, I meant to answer and then I got immersed in the scent of this apple pie. — Yes, I play. Sometimes on Saturdays, a lot since Thanksgiving, when the Stanford Chess club plays, I join in. I'm not a regular member, and those folks kick my ass, but I enjoy it — the game, I mean, not so much the ass-kicking."

"Well, maybe we can play later. I love to play but Delta rates the game a bore," Charlie explained, laughing when he saw Delta nodding her silent agreement.

"I'd be happy to play," Chuck said, "but I can't promise I'll challenge you."

"Oh," Charlie said, a speculative look in his eyes, "I'm sure you'll do, that you'll more than do."

"So," Lou asked in the silence that followed Charlie's pronouncement, "did Chuck meet Sentinel?"

"Yes, although Sentinel was rude to our guest." Charlie related what happened at the fence.

Lou looked out into the field as she listened. Sentinel was farther away from the house now and Chuck had to look hard to see him.

"That's odd," Lou commented, mostly to herself. "Sentinel likes everybody. I was hoping to ride him tomorrow."

"Well, Lou, he'll probably be his old, sweet self tomorrow," Delta commented. "It'd be strange for him to be strange for long."

"Yes, it would," Lou agreed, still gazing at the distant animal.

They ate their pie and drank their coffee as dusk gathered.

The sound of insects as the darkness encroached was something Chuck was unused to, and he enjoyed the sound. The air was surprisingly cool. Delta eventually hugged herself, breaking the quiet that had settled on the porch.

"It's a mite chilly for me now. I'm going to go inside. Anyone want more coffee, anything?"

All declined. Charlie stood and began to gather the plates and cups.

"Go in where it's warmer, folks, and I will clean up out here."

Delta and Lou were seated in two armchairs close together, talking low about something. Chuck could not hear and he thought the topic might have been him. Given their frequent soft laughter, he rated himself better off not knowing that for sure.

Charlie had unfolded a small table and rolled out a chessboard on it. He was currently putting his pieces, black, on one side. Chuck mirrored him, white, on the other.

Charlie put his queen in position and looked across the board at Chuck.

"Chess, as has often been observed, seems in many ways a meet representation of life, don't you think, Chuck?"

"I don't know, maybe if you're British, with, you know, a royal family."

Charlie laughed. "I had in mind a less literal representation. I mean that winning at chess and winning at life are similar, that chess provides a simplified, stylized representation of winning at life."

Chuck looked straight at Charlie. "I didn't know life was a game."

"No, Chuck? But aren't we all players, Homo Ludens?"

"Homo Ludens?"

"Yes, the human, the player. Isn't that a better definition of what we are than Homo Sapiens, the human, the thinker?"

"I don't know," Chuck said, puzzled about the extent to which Charlie was serious and to which Charlie was joking. "I can see lots in human life that's game-like, but that doesn't make human life itself a game."

Charlie beamed. "A thoughtful answer, thoughtful! But, consider chess. To win it is necessary, in almost any conceivable game between equals, to sacrifice pieces. The trick is sacrificing the right pieces at the right time.."

Charlie paused and motioned for Chuck to make a move. Breathing out, Chuck advanced his Queen's pawn two spaces.

"But you can win without losing pieces, or taking pieces, right?" Chuck asked as he waited for Charlie to move.

Charlie advanced his king's pawn one space.

"Ah, yes, Fool's Mate. But that is a gimmick. It does not occur between serious players."

Chuck paused. Charlie's move was not the counter Chuck expected. He twisted his lips to one side as he stared at the board.

"So, you think that winning at life requires sacrificing the right pieces in the right places at the right time?"

"I do."

Chuck shook his head while advancing his king's pawn two spaces.

"But what in life counts as a piece? Is it some possession, or some event, or some person? Because I don't know if I think it could count as a win if you have to sacrifice some person. I'm not sure there's a right time and place to sacrifice the right person."

Charlie looked up from the board. He seemed to be pondering Chuck. After a moment, he looked back at the board and moved his Queen's knight up and over to his Bishop's file.

Chuck glanced up from the pieces, somewhat surprised again by Charlie's move. "So, you are conceding the center of the board to me?"

Charlie smiled. "For now; I'm playing the Pirc Defense."

Shaking his head, Chuck looked back at the board. "I've not heard of that, but then again, I don't have much of formal education at chess. I just picked the game up, I've never studied it. But I don't recall anyone making those moves in a game with me before."

"Some great players do not like the Defense. It is initially concessive; it yields white control of the center, at least for a time, requiring active, aggressive counterplay by black if black is to win. The danger for black is passivity — the initial concession can sometimes lead to passivity. Without giving my entire strategy away, let's just say that for black to counterplay effectively, black must work from the flanks to undermine white's position."

Chuck nodded and looked Charlie in the eye. "You're a Resistance fighter too."

Charlie seemed surprised but then he slowly nodded back at Chuck. "I guess you could say that, yes."

Casey finished up with the San Francisco CIA team and got a ride from one of them to the apartment building he and Walker both lived in. She had been there for a while; Casey had only been there a week.

The team had found hair on the bedcover and they were going to analyze it to see if it was a DNA match for Bartowski. But Casey was now as sure as Walker that Bartowski had been there. Part of Casey's certainty was an off-shoot of Walker's. He trusted her instincts. But his own instincts had gone in favor of that verdict too.

He was not in a hurry to spend more time with Bryce Larkin. Larkin was the sort of pretty-boy agent that Casey hated most, the one who was constantly posing for his own benefit, as if he were his own photographer for the cover of Spy Monthly. He also disliked Larkin's constant innuendo in conversations with Walker, and the way he never managed to keep his eyes off Walker's backside anytime she did not face him. Larkin was more interested in Walker's ass than he was in the mission. In fact, Walker's ass was Larkin's true mission.

Casey was not much more fond of Jill Roberts. He understood the choice of her as Bartowski's girlfriend — she had a nerdy, academic vibe that rhymed well with Bartowski's. She was just pretty enough to be almost out of Bartowski's league while not quite pretty enough to discourage him from taking a swing or two. Casey granted her competence as an agent and her professionalism. She genuinely liked her mark, liked Bartowski, but she'd managed that fact, kept it from leading her either into his bed or into resisting or grousing about her mission. Still, there was something about her that Casey didn't warm to, although he could not say what it was. Maybe it was the eagerness with which she took up with Larkin when the mission demanded it, her willingness to sleep with him. Casey knew it went wholly against protocol, knew he would never admit to it, but he would have disliked her less if she'd slept with Bartowski instead. That kid had loved her and she knew it. Larkin's only love interest was himself, and Roberts had to know that. She was too smart not to know it.

But Casey was, as he rode the elevator up to Walker's floor, getting more and more curious about Walker herself. The more he thought about the day, the entire day, all the scenes of it included, the more he felt like there was a pattern, a meaning, in Walker's behavior that was important but that he did not understand. He had decided that he was going to pay closer attention to her. He did not know her well, — God, no, no one does, including Walker herself, I bet! —, but he was puzzled by something about the day, about the entire operation.

Why was Carina sent packing? Why go to such elaborate lengths to set Bartowski up? Casey could not remember an operation he participated in that he found quite so odd. True, he was a late-comer to the party, and Walker had not been forthcoming with details, but...something.

...Something...

Casey shook his head to clear it as he knocked softly on Walker's door.

The door was opened by Roberts, not Walker. Roberts stared at Casey then stepped to the side to allow Casey to enter. She shut the door after he did.

Walker was standing looking out one of her apartment windows, her arms crossed, her face flinty. Larkin, predictably, was looking at Walker.

Walker turned when the door closed and looked at Casey, her arms still crossed, more as if she were hugging herself than standing in judgment. She was still wearing what she had worn earlier in the day.

"Well, Casey, find anything?"

"Nothing definite yet, but they found some hair they'll try to match to Bartowski's DNA. But you've convinced me; I'm sure he was there."

"I gave them some of his hair early on," Roberts volunteered as if she were to be congratulated.

No one congratulated her and she shot Larkin a look he missed since his eyes were elsewhere. Roberts followed his gaze with a frown.

"When will they know?" Walker asked — demanded.

"Soon. They'll call me."

"Good." Walker's tone was clipped, edgy. Casey could see circles forming around her eyes. She dropped her arms and walked to an armchair, sat down on the edge of the seat, holding herself very straight. "Neither Roberts nor Larkin reports any reason to have been suspicious of Palone. During the time Roberts dated him, she rarely saw Palone on campus and never with Bartowski. Bartowski never mentioned her.

"He and she had a class in the same building at the same time and they chatted in the hallway afterward twice. Roberts and Larkin passed by each time and at neither time did Roberts think Bartowski seemed much interested."

Larkin shifted his gaze from Walker for long enough to shrug. "He might have been, but seeing Jill pass by with me dampened any enthusiasm he might have had." Now Larkin seemed to expect a chuckle, a reaction, but he was the only one who chuckled.

"But she — Pivot — must have known about him for a while, must have planned in response to our plan, right?" Casey addressed his question to Walker.

She stood. "Yes, they must have known about him for a while. They must have some way of getting information about what we are doing, some mole or double-agent, something."

"I tell you," Casey offered, his voice dropping, "we should check on Miller, where she was today."

Sarah crossed her arms again. "Miller is not a double-agent, Casey. I...fired her...but not because she was leaking intel to Pivot."

"Why did you fire her?" Larkin asked. Walker gave him a look so withering that he finally looked at something other than her.

"That's between Miller and me, end — of — story."

Casey shrugged. "Okay, but are you sure of the techs we were using today?"

Walker nodded. "Only the one, the one talking to us while Bartowski was in SpyCraft, was really in the know. He's been with the project for a long time. The others were brought in last-minute, and told nothing about what they were doing, about the operation; they just helped the other tech. There are a couple of other scientists at Langley, but they're Graham's responsibility — and he trusts them. And they would have known little of the local logistics, but Pivot, Palone, knew. The campus cameras prove it."

Roberts sat down on the couch beside Larkin. "Well," she said in a slightly petulant tone, "Pivot knows Chuck...um, Bartowski. Palone is his type to a T. Give her a little time and he'll be Silly Putty in her hands."

Walker frowned.

Casey shrugged. "At least she left behind all her lingerie."

Larkin laughed and Roberts glared at him. She turned to Walker. "So what do we do? We've got no leads, nothing."

"We'll have to hope the continued digging into the ownership of the soup kitchen turns up a clue, or that we get lucky and we find footage of them on a surveillance camera somewhere. Langley's running facial recognition searches now and has others running them, but getting a hit would just be luck." Walker's voice contained a hint of desperation. "For now, we just need to get some sleep and start again in the morning, hoping for a break."

Casey walked to the door. "Then I'm going to my place. I'll let you know if I hear about DNA confirmation."

Roberts got up and waited for Larkin to join her. "We'll head back to my place near campus. Let us know what you need us to do in the morning."

Casey left the room and they followed.

Sarah locked her door and returned to the window, crossing her arms again. She felt cold and stretched, exhausted.

She was staring out into the dark when a phone rang. Walker knew it was a phone's ring — but it was not her phone's ring.

It was Chuck's phone.

She moved into her bedroom and opened the nightstand. The phone's face was aglow with a picture of an attractive brunette. The name, Ellie, was below the picture. Chuck's sister.

For a moment, Sarah stood frozen.

And then she reached down and picked up the phone.

Sarah knew all about Ellie, had surveilled her several times, or surveilled Chuck when he visited his sister. But Sarah had never spoken to Ellie; Ellie had never seen Sarah.

But maybe Ellie knew something. And Sarah did not want Chuck's sister worried, did not want Ellie to start hunting for her brother, calling his friends, campus security, the police.

"Hi," Sarah said, her voice warm and breathy and cheery — but sleepy, "this is Chuck's phone."

There was a moment of silence, then an uncertain voice, Ellie's: "Oh, hi, this is Chuck's sister, Ellie." Another pause. "Is he there?"

Sarah paused deliberately then chuckled softly. "He's here, but he's...sleeping. The phone woke me but not him."

In the following silence, Sarah could hear Ellie thinking. "Right, um, okay. Who are you, if you don't mind me asking?"

"I don't mind," Sarah said, maintaining her tone and pretending to yawn, allowing Ellie to hear, "I'm Sam. Chuck's told me all about you. I've been looking forward to meeting you."

"So you and Chuck are...close?"

Sarah chuckled again. "You could say that. But I'll let him tell you. Should I wake him? He's been gaming all day and...busy with me tonight."

"No, no, Sam. Don't wake him. He's not at his best when he first wakes up. Just tell him I called and tell him to call me." There was another pause. "But he doesn't have to hurry. Tell him I was...happy...to chat with you and he can call whenever is convenient." Ellie's voice had become excited; she did sound happy. "Sam, you said?"

Sarah suddenly realized what she had done. She had spoken the name without thought, attending to her tone, to the situation she was imagining, and she'd simply said it, said 'Sam'. Her name. The one she was given when she was born. She'd never used it as a cover name, never even shared it with anyone. Not Carina. No one.

"Yes, Sam." She was committed now.

"And you've known Chuck...for a while?"

"Not so long, as the clock goes," Sarah said, chuckling again, "but long enough, you know?"

Ellie's tone quieted, became confidential. "He's a good guy."

"Yes," Sarah agreed, "he's a very good guy." Sarah then heard her own comment. "Um, I didn't mean, you know, like that…" She didn't have to pretend to be flustered; she now was flustered. "I just meant that he's...sweet."

"Sweet?" Ellie said as if she were surprised. "That's true," she said after a moment, "he is sweet. He has been since he was little."

There was another silence, this one awkward. Ellie broke it. "I should let you go. It's been nice to talk to you."

"You too, Ellie. I hope we can meet soon. Chuck and I have plans tomorrow, but I'll make sure he calls you."

"No, no, Sam, no need. You two have your day, enjoy yourselves. Chuck can call whenever. It's really been nice to talk to you."

"Thanks, Ellie." Sarah let her voice become quieter. "Good night!"

"Good night!"

Sarah ended the call and dropped the phone on the bed. She'd bought time — but at what cost?

What the hell am I doing?

Ellie looked at the phone in her hand in happy disbelief.

Sam? Sam! At Chuck's, and sleeping with him!

Ding dong the witch is dead, the wicked witch is dead!

Chuck had finally moved on, found someone else. Ellie had never liked Jill Roberts, but she'd positively hated her for what she had done to Chuck over the past few months.

This Sam sounded nice. Friendly, warm. Sam. Sam thinks Chuck is sweet!

Ellie danced a little in her apartment for the sheer joy of it.

"Mate," Charlie said softly, looking up at Chuck.

Chuck checked the board. Mate. He nodded.

"You played well, Chuck," Charlie said, smiling, "very well. You could become very good at chess if you gave yourself over to the game."

Chuck shrugged, embarrassed. "Maybe. But I doubt I'll ever get serious about it."

Lou had heard Charlie's Mate and stood. "Charlie, I think I should take Chuck and show him where we'll sleep. I mean, where his room is and mine."

Delta chuckled and stood too. "Yes, Chuck, odd as it sounds, our guest rooms are in the barn. We recently redid the barn and put in very nice rooms, each with a bath, for visitors. We have lots of folks who come here because of the horses. Our extra bedrooms in the house have been converted to a library and an office."

Lou smiled. "I told Chuck he'd be sleeping in the barn but that it wasn't as bad as it sounded."

Charlie stood up too. "I must say, this seems like the beginning of a Farmer's Daughter joke. Do they still tell those these days?"

Delta shushed Charlie. "Enough, Charlie. You've beaten our guest at chess, no reason to make him uncomfortable. And Lou is not your — not our — daughter."

"No, but she seems like she is."

Lou smiled more brightly. "Thanks, Charlie."

Charlie and Delta walked Chuck and Lou to the porch and said their goodnights. Lou led Chuck down the porch steps and toward the barn. As they crossed to it, Chuck glanced back.

Charlie and Delta were going back inside, but Chuck thought he saw a man looking out one of the upstairs windows. But when Chuck looked a second time, he could see no one there.

He started to ask Lou when he felt her hand warm on his. "I hope you enjoyed dinner. Maybe not quite the date dinner we had in mind, but…"

"No," Chuck agreed, "but it was nice. They're quite a couple. Hard to believe they are spies...or whatever."

Lou laughed quietly. "Not all spies are like Sarah Walker, Chuck. There are spies...who care. And not just about the mission, or about themselves."

Lou gave Chuck's hand a warm squeeze and she opened a side door to the barn.

A light came on as they entered, evidently triggered by their motion. They were in a small sitting room. A desk occupied one wall, a TV another. The opposite wall had two doors in it. Lou dropped Chuck's hand and pointed to them. "Those are our rooms. I normally stay in the one on the left; you can have the one on the right."

Chuck nodded. "Say, Lou, is there someone else at Horseplay Farm? I thought I saw someone upstairs, at a window."

"No," Lou said, shaking her head, "not that I know of. There are two or three hands who work on the farm, but they usually work from dawn until the early afternoon. They left before we arrived. No one else is here. But these old farmhouses, the light in them, it can play tricks on you."

"I guess," Chuck said, no longer sure he saw anyone at all.

"I'm going to shower and then go to bed." She reached for Chuck's hand again and looked into his eyes. "Try to get some sleep, okay. I know it's been a long day."

Chuck suddenly felt exhausted. He squeezed Lou's hand. "Thanks, Lou, for today, for everything."

Chuck had gone straight to bed. Even with everything that had happened, he fell asleep almost immediately. He woke to the sound of bare feet in his room. His door was open a crack, letting in a shaft of light. He saw Lou. She was standing in the light, silhouetted by it. At first, he thought she was naked, then he saw a bit of color: she was in red lingerie. His room was filled with the scent of her shampoo.

Without knowing why he did it, he pretended to still be asleep. He heard Lou sigh softly. "Tomorrow night, then." She padded from the room.

Chuck opened his eyes and stared at the ceiling.

What was that? Was Lou coming to sleep with me? But I barely know her. She's great but...and after Jill, what I found out?

He pondered the visit for a while, fighting down a temptation to get up and go to Lou's room.

Eventually, he began to feel sleepy again.

He could still smell Lou's shampoo distinctly as he drifted off, but he dreamt of an indistinct, redheaded woman.

Carina got out of the taxi and put her credit card back in her purse. She looked up at the building she'd been staying in.

A light was on in Walker's apartment.

As the taxi pulled away behind her, Carina looked again to make sure. Yes, a light was on in Walker's apartment.

Carina was tipsy and she knew it, under the influence of a few too many drinks and a few too many dances. It was not a good idea to face Walker at less than full power.

But Carina had expected Walker to be on her way back to DC — with Bartowski beside her, Bartowski either on a chain or in a body bag.

Why was Walker still in her apartment?

Carina's anger flared anew. Walker. Blondie. Unable to stop herself, she marched through the lobby and invaded the elevator, punching the button for Walker's floor.

A/N: More soon, I hope.

My thanks to Beckster1213 and WvonB for pre-reading.