Chuck vs. the Load Balancer – Chapter 4
Author's Note: Thank you for the patience that you have had to give me to get this story out. I am glad that many of you are liking it so far, I hope this chapter meets all of your expectations.
Another note on load balancing:
Beyond just having multiple infrastructure resources, load balancing often involves duplication of content and application workloads, such that more than one copy of a resource can be accessed.
- From the serverwatch website on load balancing
Balancing Beginnings
Chuck looked into the sapphire depths of the woman's eyes, no longer the stranger of his dreams, he knew her name.
"Sarah…", he whispered almost to himself.
Sarah smiled gently at him, "Hi Chuck. I'm so glad that I can put a name to the beach guy. I was so scared that you were a figment of my imagination."
"Heh, yeah… I know the feeling."
The two looked at each other for another minute before turning to look at the waves as they came ashore.
"So… well… um… I've never asked, but how did this happen Sarah? I know why I'm here, but how did you get here? That is if… well… I don't know if that is too personal a question… but…."
"It's OK Chuck, I can tell you what I know. But there are some things that you probably can't know."
"Oh… yeah… I mean I don't want to pry into your personal life… I mean boyfriends… that kind of thing…"
"Chuck! Slow down! That isn't what I'm talking about – though yeah… that IS kinda personal, but we've been meeting in this dream? Hallucination? I'm not sure what to call it… for years now…"
"The Intersect."
Sarah's eyes glazed over and began quickly roaming, before stopping and she turned to look at Chuck.
"Oh, that is what it's called. How come you know? And even more importantly how did you get here?"
Chuck smiled, knowing somehow in his heart that he could trust this woman. Sarah was correct, they had been meeting here long enough that he implicitly knew he would trust her with his life.
"Well Sarah, that's quite a story. I guess it begins with a note that my mom left a long time ago and what happened when I was ten years old…"
Chuck then told Sarah everything. From the first time wandering into his Dad's office and downloading an incomplete Intersect that his dad was working on to help an old friend. The same friend that had caused his mom to disappear without a trace – which in turn caused his dad to lose sight of his two children and focus solely on his Intersect research. To this day Chuck still didn't know the full story except that his Dad and his Dad's best friend had been working on the original Intersect in the closing days of the Cold War when something had happened.
Chuck grimaced as he told of the first time he had an "occurrence". It had happened in front of Morgan who had completely freaked out and screamed for Ellie and Chuck's dad. When they had arrived Chuck was on the floor of the living room clutching his head in a fetal position crying and yelling for the images to stop.
Sarah at this point was watching Chuck and softly put her hand on his arm in an effort to comfort him a little.
Chuck grinned at her, "Actually that first Flash, as my Dad and I began to call them, was a good thing. Because that is when he stopped looking for ways to help his friend and focused on helping me instead. He started to look more and more into ways to balance the load of the Intersect. See his theory that the brain was a large computer was correct, but pulling that information the way the Intersect was set up tended to overload the processor – in other words the Intersect was too powerful for just one person."
"So… does that mean…" Sarah couldn't finish the sentence. The answer was too immense to her… because she knew the answer.
Chuck looked at her as Sarah retracted her hand from his arm. She pulled her legs up in front of her chest and wrapped her arms around them, then leaned her head so her face was hidden by her arms.
"Chuck?" Sarah's voice was quiet and in that one word question full of concern and fear.
"Yes Sarah, you have the Intersect too. I'm sorry…."
Sarah heard something in his voice. A fear that mirrored her own – a fear that something that had recently been found might be taken away – a fear of being alone again. And Sarah knew somehow that she couldn't do that to him. Not the kind man that she had known since that night while working on the Omaha Project. Not the man who was her stabilizer.
"So Chuck… please tell me the rest." Sarah said, turning her head toward him and staring into those brown eyes that were full of trepidation and fear. "How did you and I get here?"
Chuck sighed, realizing that she wasn't leaving – that she wanted to hear the rest of the story. So he told her. He told her how his father went to the government and pitched the idea to the Alphabets, how the FBI and DOD's DARPA snubbed him as crazy, while the NSA and the CIA were interested. How his dad continued to refine the code and how he tried to help Chuck control the flashes after failing to find a way to extract the Intersect from his son's brain. How his dad told Chuck that while Ellie and Morgan knew of the "occurrences", they could never know of the full extent of the Intersect. Instead they were told that Chuck had a condition that caused severe and debilitating migraines.
Chuck stopped talking for a minute, and then taking a deep sigh. "Sarah, this went on for years. Dad worked with the two Alphabets to find a candidate. Someone who could handle the Intersect – and by that time the information wasn't causing the flashes to cause migraines, of course we didn't know this because none of the candidates that were tested had been viable Intersect agents. Dad started to lose hope and was beginning to think that maybe he should focus more on suppressing the Intersect instead of removing it from me. But then you came along."
Sarah's breath caught and she stared at Chuck, who once again looked afraid that she would bolt at that information.
"Sarah, this is where your story with the Intersect begins. My dad never told me that he had found you. By that time, he only had remote contact with Ellie and I as he was nervous that someone in the Alphabets was looking to use the Intersect for something other than to help people – something that scared my dad from the first time he and his friend had discovered it in the first place. So how did you get to be in Project Omaha?"
Sarah put her head back down and tears filled her eyes. She didn't want to tell Chuck of her past for the same reason he hadn't wanted to tell her about how the two of them came to be in the Intersect. If she told him, he would run, he would want to get away from her and her crazy and violence-ridden life. And she would once again be alone…
Orion and the Alphabets
"General Beckman? Are you in a secure location?"
"Yes, I am. Orion? Is that you?"
"Yes, yes. I wanted to let you know that it appears it has worked."
The line was quiet for a minute.
"General. You need to know that it worked and we have an actual working Intersect."
"What? I heard you the first time. Did my agent find them?"
"Yes, Major Casey was able to replicate Larkin's email and get the most recent update to the Prime. That triggered Graham's sending of Agent Walker as we knew he would."
"All right. But that doesn't prove Graham is corrupt – does it?"
"No General it doesn't. Yet."
"OK, where is Agent Larkin now and what's the status with the Prime and the Balancer now?"
"I don't know where Larkin has disappeared to, he told me that he had to find something out about a Red Test and that he would contact when he had more information. Both the Prime and the Balancer are at Westside Medical and appear to be in a coma-like state."
"WHAT?! And you're just telling me now? Where is Major Casey?"
"The Major is with them and is on protective duty. This is only temporary General. The Intersect had to reset itself, and share the updates with the Balancer as she was a couple of years behind."
"Yes, yes, I know. After appearing to shut down Project Omaha we couldn't very well continue to upload new upgrades to Agent Walker, not with how close she is to Graham. Are you sure we can trust her though Orion? Agent Walker is Graham's wild card, his enforcer. She cleans up the messes and she does it ruthlessly. I'm not sure…"
"General, believe me when I say this: I trust Agent Walker with the Prime's life, and no one else. Not even Major Casey has more trust in my eyes."
"OK Orion, we will go with your judgement on this. What's next?"
"Once the Intersect completes the reset and the load balancing protocols, the two of them should awake and be fine."
"Will they be field ready?"
"I believe so, yes. Will you help protect the Prime though?"
"You have my word Orion."
The line was again quiet, "I will hold you to that Dianne…"
"I know you will Stephen, I know you will."
Click… the line went dead and the small General began to think of the next moves in the game of espionage that she was engaged in.
Westside Medical Waiting Room
Morgan Grimes was tired of waiting. This had to be the worst thing to happen to his best friend in so long. The only time it was worse was that first time he had witnessed one of Chuck's occurrences as they had been playing Super Mario Brothers. It had freaked him out then, but this – this was at a whole new level.
Morgan began hyperventilating as he kept circling around the idea that he might just lose Chuck. That is when he felt a small hand on the back of his neck gently rubbing and pushing his head down between his knees.
"Breathe Morgan, breathe…" Lou whispered in his ear. "Chuck is going to be all right. Ellie and Devon won't let anything bad happen to him. You know that and I know that… so breathe… OK?"
Lou continued to calmly talk to him and slowly Morgan's breathing returned to normal. He closed his eyes and concentrated on Lou's words and her hand as it gently but firmly held him down. It felt good, that small hand on the back of his neck. Lou's words softly made him calmer and calmer, and he thought how great of a friend Lou was to both him and Chuck.
"Thanks Lou."
Lou realizing that Morgan was no longer hyperventilating stopped putting the pressure on his neck and Morgan sat up.
"Thanks for driving me over here, and for staying."
"Chuck's my friend too Morgan, you know that and I am just as worried as you are."
"I know you are – I know you are."
Unconsciously, Morgan sat up and took Lou's hand in his.
"Just thanks for being such a great friend to us both Lou."
Lou smiled as she held Morgan's hand in hers and waited with him for news of their friend.
They Couldn't Hide Forever
"Status Agent."
"The Major is in LA as is the Enforcer."
"Do you know why?"
"Not yet sir, we are working on it."
"Not good enough. LA is too close to Rourke Industries for this to be a coincidence. We are sending Tommy as back up. I want this situation figured out ASAP."
"Sir, do you think sending Fulcrum muscle is a bit much? I mean we don't even know if RI is the target yet."
"I have a feeling Fulcrum is going to be needed. You agents in Volkoff Industries sometimes get too hung up on playing with your gadgets and toys that you forget that some situations just need a little more… physical… persuasion."
"Yes sir. I will inform Tommy of the current situation when he arrives."
"Good, and if anything changes, inform me immediately."
"Yes sir."
Westside Medical Neurological Wing, Room 2
Ellie was frustrated.
There was nothing on either Sarah or Chuck's EEG readings that appeared out of the ordinary. There were spikes in the readings but as neither of them seemed to be in any distress Ellie couldn't figure out what was causing them. Though as she stood between the two beds where her patients were laying still holding hands she continued to look at the individual read outs.
"Oh Chuck, what is going on?"
Ellie was getting more and more worried, and then she had a thought and placed the two read outs side by side. Her breathe caught in her chest as Ellie stared at the read outs.
They were spiking at exactly the same time.
"My God, they are syncing…"
Ellie raised her hand to her mouth in shock.
"Dad… what did you do?"
Complete Reset
As Sarah panicked at what was being asked of her, she knew that she couldn't share everything with Chuck. He would panic being this close to a killer, to the Ice Queen, to Graham's Wild-card Enforcer, to a myriad of other names and titles each more soul crushing than the last. As Sarah's thoughts continued to spiral, she felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. Her breathing caught again in her chest and with a large amount of trepidation, she turned her tear-stained face toward Chuck, and what she saw surprised her.
Chuck was looking at her with concern and kindness, and something else that Sarah couldn't begin to put into words. But somehow it touched her, and she knew Chuck would never judge her for her past.
"I'm sorry Chuck."
"Don't be Sarah, and please don't ever feel that you need to tell me anything. You and I are in a situation that no one else on this planet has ever been in, and as such we can and should cut each other a whole lot of slack. OK?"
She smiled at him and softly whispered, "Thanks Chuck that means a lot."
Chuck squeezed her shoulder and smiled gently at her, "Yeah, yeah, um… no problem. I am wondering how you got here. I mean… I know we have been meeting here for a while, but I've never thought to ask how you got here. You don't have to ans…"
"Well, I volunteered for a program that the CIA was conducting, I had been an agent for a couple of years by that time, and with my record I was approached and asked if I was interested, and after thinking about it I chose to volunteer. The program was supposed to be a way to help train agents quicker and get them to the peak of their skills without putting them in the field, and I was supposed to be one of the control group."
"Ahh, I see. Did any of it hurt?"
"No, the only thing I couldn't figure out were the dreams, they seemed like just random pictures with no pattern", Sarah let out a soft chuckle, "Well… until I met you."
Chuck smiled, and murmured, "Oh that's good, I'm glad you weren't hurt by the flashes."
Sarah noticed Chuck's attitude had changed, "Do the flashes hurt you Chuck?"
Chuck looked at her, and she was startled by the feelings she could see telegraphed across his face. His eyes especially. They tightened around the edges and the color went darker brown and the irises widened as he held his breath slightly.
After what seemed like hours of looking at her, Chuck turned and let out the breath he was holding and as he stared out to sea, he nodded. Small. Like he hoped that Sarah wouldn't noticed the tiny movement of his chin as it moved up and down slightly.
Before she realized what she was doing, Sarah eliminated the small distance between them and threw her arm across his shoulders and leaned her head on his shoulder.
"Oh Chuck, I'm sorry."
Chuck's hand crossed over his chest and grabbed Sarah's hand that was on his shoulder and gave it a gentle squeeze, "Thanks Sarah."
"You're welcome. So I have a question or two, do you think the reset is finished and if it is, how do we get out of here?"
Chuck chuckled to himself, "Why Miss Walker, are you anxious to be rid of me that quickly?"
She bumped his shoulder with hers, "No Chuck, but all of a sudden I have a craving for a large margarita with an umbrella in it and some decent Mexican food – that is if you're game – I mean I don't know Burbank that well and thought maybe you would be gentleman and take a …." At that point Sarah stopped and came to a sudden conclusion of how she was sitting with Chuck, her arm and head on his shoulder while he was holding her hand. It felt natural. It felt right. It felt scary as hell to her and she pulled her hand away and sat up straighter. In her haste, she didn't see the look of disappointment appear and disappear quickly on Chuck's face.
"Oh yeah, I would love to grab dinner with you. Now let's figure out how to get out of here, cause the reset has to have finished, right?"
Chuck stood up and turned, reaching down to offer Sarah his right hand, and she smiled and with her left hand grabbed his hand and as he pulled her to her feet. Chuck must have pulled too hard though because instead of coming to her feet she felt pulled into Chuck's chest, and the two of them fell backward into some kind of bright light.
Introductions… of a Sort
Ellie was the first one to notice that something different was happening. Chuck's deep breathing continued, but the movement of his eyes that had been rapidly moving back and forth as though he was in REM sleep had stopped. She held her breath as she waited to see if there were any other signs of either of the two people in front of her waking up. Ellie smiled as Sarah let out a groan like someone would make who had been fast asleep and wanted to stay that way.
At that point Ellie made an executive decision and called Devon, instructing him to get Morgan and Lou to join her in the room with Chuck and Sarah as they were coming out of whatever episode they had been in.
The bright light of the hospital room made Chuck throw his forearm over his closed eyes as he made one of those waking groans, "Who turned on the lights? Can't you see that someone is trying to sleep?"
Ellie quickly moved to dim the lights as much as possible, hoping that her patients would be more responsive without the glare of the room lights beaming down on them. Once that was done, Ellie moved back to stand between the two beds. Her eyes still looking at the various medical instruments that her brother and the woman were connected to and satisfied that nothing was wrong, at least medically speaking.
"Ellie, is that you?"
Ellie's breath caught in her throat and she moved quickly to pull Chuck up and into a bear hug.
"Oh Chuck, I was so scared!"
Chuck's returned the hug, as much as he could as he was still holding the other woman's hand.
"It's fine Ellie… I'm fine. I promise." Chuck wheezed out with what little oxygen he could get into his lungs.
Ellie released her brother just as the others arrived in the room. Devon using his moniker as a greeting, while Lou smiled and Morgan almost crushed Ellie as he moved to hug his best friend.
When the greetings were finally made, the four stepped back to look at their friend and brother. He smiled shyly at them until he noticed that his hand was still entwined with Sarah's, who was finally coming around enough to sit up. She smiled at Chuck after noticing that his hand was still firmly holding hers and giving it an occasional squeeze. When she stopped looking at Chuck and realized where she was and that there were other people in the room with them, Sarah gasped and readied to fight through them all.
"It's OK Sarah, this is my family. Family, this is Sarah. She is here to help me."
Author's Note Part Two: There ya go, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I wanted to point out that someone commented on the ballet dancer, actually I have that in the plans because I love that scene, so it will be in this story, just in a different spot. I am planning to get our pair out on their first mission in the next chapter, and to be the Major. Thank you for reading and for the previous reviews, they have made my day.