The long awaited answer to an question that has remained open FAR too long.
Chapter 14
Sarah's sobs gradually softened to sniffles and Chuck continued to hold her after even those had faded into silence. It wasn't until Sarah started to snore softly that Chuck gently brought her back to consciousness.
"Wake up, Sarah. Let's get you tucked into your bed and you can sleep as long as you want," he assured her.
"Nooooo," Sarah whined so piteously that she wanted to slap herself. "I wanna get tucked into YOUR bed."
Chuck laughed softly, "We can discuss that another time. You've had a rough couple days and need time to recuperate."
Sarah quickly shook herself to full alertness and stood with her face inches from his, "Charles Irving Bartowski, do you have any idea how much self control it's taking to resist the urge to tear off all your clothes and ravish you right here? I've wasted FIVE YEARS maintaining space between us and if you think my soul can tolerate another minute of this nonsense you haven't been listening."
Sarah gave Chuck a moment to process her words before continuing with unabated ferocity, "If YOU need space between us, then fine, the pain is no more than I deserve but don't you DARE suggest we sleep in separate beds to give ME time to recover."
Chuck took a deep steadying breath before responding, "Fine, let's go."
He took her hand and they quick marched through the manor house to a bedroom suite far from any of the rooms Sarah had seen. As Chuck closed the door, Sarah felt a moment of panic. Was this actually happening? She had dreamed about this many times, how did she know she wasn't dreaming now? Chuck slowly made his way to her, bent down, and kissed her.
The kiss started out soft and gently undulated as they took turns making slight adjustments. Sarah held Chuck's head as a combination of increased suction and sliding down brought his lower lip into her mouth. She pulled away for a moment and playfully ran her tongue along his upper lip and suddenly they both caught fire. As they both sought to find a way to get ever more physical contact and explore ever more territory, Sarah began unbuttoning Chuck's shirt. She eagerly ran her fingers and face over each new swath of skin exposed to taste/touch/smell. She lightly traced the muscles of his back with her fingernails. Suddenly she became very aware of the fact that she was on her knees and her exploration was halted by Chuck's belt.
Sarah looked up a him, a question and a plea in her eyes. He answered with a soft smile and she carefully unbuckled and unzipped him. Then she dug her hands into pants and briefs and slowly pulled downward, continuing to explore even more skin. Suddenly Chuck's member bobbed free, slapping her face lightly and making her giggle.
She sat back on her heels to get a good look at this legendary artifact she had discovered. She was utterly fascinated by it. Her rational brain assured her that she had seen the like before but her emotions and senses disagreed. This one was utterly unique to her and she tentatively brushed her fingertips along its length provoking a sharp intake of breath from above her.
That gasp planted the seed of something wonderful within her and she nurtured it, causing sounds to rise, fall, and modulate in pitch. Her own sensory experience played counterpoint to the noises Chuck was making and she worked to find the limits of this strange new instrument, never quite repeating the same touches of fingers and tongue and certainly never allowing herself to fall into any kind of rhythm. She was a focused and diligent student of this wonderful new musical instrument she had discovered.
She was so lost in her learning that she wasn't even aware of her own contribution to the sonic tapestry until a mighty bass groan escaped her lips. Chuck crouched and drew her up into a standing position.
Their roles reversed and he repeated a similar sensory sampling of her. Sarah started to feel a bit light headed. Her senses were starting to overload and she felt the desire to leave her body and watch from the outside. That desire quickly fell into a deep pit of yearning. She fought through her shivering and spread the wings of her sensorium wide to pull in every dimension of sensation and feeling. It stretched her to her limits until she realized that what she had been certain was a bottomless pit was in fact an artesian well overflowing like a glorious fountain.
Sensing her rapidly mounting excitement, Chuck broke off his expedition, scooped her up, and gently laid her on the bed. As he donned a condom and climbed in from the other side, Sarah was suddenly pierced by an attack of shyness. How would she measure up to all the other women he had known? Would he like her? For every other man she had been with she had carefully locked the feeling part of her away in a soundproof bank vault. In a very real way, this was her first time. Despite her fears she wanted this more than she had ever dreamed it was possible to want. She rolled back onto her shoulders and hooked her arms under her legs.
When Chuck finally knelt before her as she lay wide-eyed and utterly exposed he said, "In the Chuck dictionary, next to the word 'beautiful', I'm putting what I see right now."
He leaned forward and kissed her, then slowly slid his body into contact with hers. She felt the firmness she ached for sliding effortlessly along her lubricated skin. He drew it back just as slowly and looked directly into her eyes, raising one eyebrow. Sarah nodded and held her breath. Chuck's penetration was agonizingly slow. She broke first, throwing her legs around him and locking her ankles in the small of his back, pulling him in as deep as she could.
Chuck resisted her attempt to start a fast, hard rhythm. His hands gripped her hips and pinned them to the bed. He began to torture her with a slow pace at varied angles. She forced herself to follow his lead and floated on the fantastic feeling of him inside her at last. She was so enraptured that she hadn't noticed him picking up the pace until it was all she could do to keep up with him.
Sarah suddenly felt a bolt of lightning surge through them both as all their voluntary muscles became iron bands binding them together while the involuntary muscles at their point of contact spasmed in sync. This perfect glorious moment was seared into the Sarah dictionary next to the word 'climax.'
As they lay beside each other, dazed and panting, neither willing to unclasp the hands that kept them physically connected, Sarah felt a light bulb go off in her head. THIS was what all the fuss was about. THIS was what drove men and women to push themselves beyond all human limits for each other. THIS was why they called it 'making love.' She rolled over and started peppering him with kisses.
"I love you I love you I love you I love you," Sarah murmured the words after every kiss.
When she finally paused in her attack, Chuck brought her hand to his lips and said, "Hello, hand that I love."
His gaze slid to her wrist and his eyes lit up, "Hello wrist that I love."
It seemed everywhere he looked there was a joyful discovery to be made, "Hello forearm that I love, Hello elbow that I love, Hello biceps that I love."
As he continued the grand tour of her body he began adding adjectives, "Hello powerful, world-holding-up shoulders that I love, hello long graceful neck that I love."
Sarah giggled as Chuck went on and on but she also flushed with bashful pride at his endless compliments.
When he got to 'tight sexy butt that I love' she interrupted by bending over and displaying it for him saying, "You love it? Well today's you're lucky day. It's 'free sample for the first guy named Chuck' day. Take a piece!" She swung her hips back and forth adding, "Limited time offer!"
She was still thinking of another way to tease him when he took her breath away by suddenly claiming his prize. She expected that after the mind blowing first time, this would be more like the sex she had been used to. She found she was very, very wrong. Chuck patiently and expertly kept her body guessing until a wave that built higher than she imagined possible crested for her and just as her body began its descent his climax kicked her back up higher than the crest before.
They had their meals delivered to the suite for the next five days. At every joining of their bodies Chuck showed her something new and Sarah was happy to experience it all with him.
On the fifth day, Chuck was giving her an extended massage and Sarah found her mind drifting. She remembered that when she was little her mom made her green eggs and ham for breakfast on her birthday. Green Eggs and Ham was HER book because it started with the words 'I am Sam.' How did it go again? Sarah's drifting mind started composing a new version of the story: I would do him on his bed, I'd do him standing on my head, I would do him on a chair, while hugging tightly like a bear, I would do him in the shower, he makes me open like a flower, I would do him in a box, cause my Chuck has the king of ahhhhhhhhh.
Chuck had found just the right angle of attack on a tense muscle and she groaned deeply in appreciation as he smoothed it into relaxation. Dear God this man knew how to make her feel good.
"I've been thinking and I don't want you to close down your sanctuary, Chuck," Sarah said as her body gratefully followed Chuck's fingers into a blissful state of well being. "It's not fair for me to hog all your attention and cut all the other women in the world off from this."
Chuck continued to work in silence for a while before he responded, "It's very kind of you to share, Sarah. How about this? Let's say the sanctuary is only temporarily closed while you and I learn from each other. When we're done learning I can reopen the sanctuary and continue sharing with other women."
"That sounds fair," Sarah agreed, satisfied with Chuck's logic. She wondered how long it would take to learn everything Chuck knew about sex. He wanted to learn from her? That would probably mean she'd be practicing all the things they had done and suggesting variations. That could take a while. Why was Katie laughing at her?
"We're never going to be done learning from each other, are we?" Sarah realized.
"I guess that depends on how much we manage to inspire each other to try new things," Chuck said with a parody of innocence.
"How long has it been since I told you how much I love you?" Sarah asked, giggling.
"It's been at least a couple hours since you said the words out loud," Chuck acknowledged. "But your cute giggle and the contented sounds you make on the massage table say that to me. I hope my fingers are telling you I love you too but just in case let me say I love my Sarah and I love my Samantha Lisa Niebieszczanski too."
Sarah gasped as her heart swelled at the words. Chuck's fingers paused as her body trembled. He leaned down and whispered into her ear.
"Never forget that I'm ALWAYS here for you, Sam. You can count on me," Chuck's whisper was hoarse with emotion.
Sarah sat up as tiny waterfalls poured from her eyes and hugged him tight. She pulled him down to whisper back to him, "Thank you for being my Chuck. Everything I am and everything I'll ever be belongs to you forever. You are my home, Chuck Bartowski."
They just held each other close for quite a while until Sarah's body shivered and Chuck let go of her to get her robe and help her into it.
"I had no idea how badly I needed you to come home," Chuck sighed. "I think my aching need for you has calmed down enough that I can allow you to take short trips to visit your friends though. Zondra and Antonia are getting increasingly insistent on knowing when you will be available."
"I guess I shouldn't have texted 'Depends on Chuck, leave me alone until I contact you' to each of them but I honestly wasn't ready to think about the world outside the suite," Sarah laughed. "I can take a short break from your sexual master class as long as you promise that from now on I can share your bed every night."
"Done and done," Chuck agreed firmly. "If there's anything so urgent I have to overnight elsewhere I'm taking you with me."
Chuck's promise hit Sarah like one of his massages, instantly relieving a tension she wasn't even aware of. At her Mmmmm, he raised an eyebrow.
"It feels SO good to hear you say that," Sarah sighed happily. "Forget what it says on ANY of my birth certificates. From now on my birthday is the day we first made love."
"As long as we made it my birthday too, I think it's completely appropriate," Chuck agreed.
They had one last long luxurious shower promising they'd allow themselves just a single orgasm each, then stick strictly to washing. Then they both dressed to face the world.
"Hey Zondra," Sarah said merrily as her friend answered her video call. "Today Chuck and I are ready to try physically separating for a couple hours to see if we can handle it. Do you have time to meet up?"
"Damn, girl, I don't think I've ever seen you giddy before," Zondra replied, amazed. "I can meet you for lunch in an hour if you promise me all the nasty details."
"How about I just give you the nastiest highlights?" Sarah laughed. "I doubt you have time to hear ALL the details."
"Fine," Zondra sighed theatrically. "Your mission is to make me blush."
"Mission Impossible? Challenge accepted," Sarah said with a lascivious grin.
Antonia was her next call.
"Sarah! So nice to see your face," Antonia gushed.
"Thank you SO much for the workshop, Antonia," Sarah replied gratefully. "And for everything you've done for me. I will always think of you as my fairy godmother."
"A title I will be honored to carry," Antonia replied warmly. "So tell me, how are you feeling?"
Sarah understood it was no idle question. She closed her eyes and emptied her mind.
"I feel peaceful and more fulfilled than I ever dreamed possible. I feel so good it terrifies me," Sarah let the words come without attempting to edit them.
"I understand completely," Antonia nodded. "You are in a state that would have been impossible just a week ago and it's too good for you to allow yourself to accept it as your new normal. Don't let yourself analyze, just stay in the moment. You don't yet have enough experience with your new configuration to form an opinion of what normality might or might not feel like."
Sarah considered Antonia's words and saw the wisdom in them. She smiled and said, "Would you be able to have dinner with me?"
Antonia glanced to one side before saying, "Would 7pm work for you?"
"Perfectly!" Sarah agreed.
Sarah decided to spend the time before lunch walking on the estate grounds and people watching. A part of her automatically evaluated them for threat indicators but a bigger part wondered about the stories of their pasts and where they might be headed in the future. It was a strange way to look at people but as she marveled at it she realized it was actually more normal than the way she was used to thinking.
She headed to the place she had agreed to meet Zondra.
"Hey girlfriend!" Zondra greeted her, holding up her hand. Sarah didn't leave her hanging, she leaped up and gave her a high five.
"So..." Zondra's eyebrows went high.
Sarah laughed and recounted the dozen specific moves Charles had used that were completely new to her but which had the greatest physical impact. Zondra was familiar with several of them but most were news to her too. Zondra spent half an hour asking clarifying questions and expressing disbelief before they remembered to order food.
"So bottom line, is he a keeper?" Zondra asked after they'd made their choices for lunch.
"I'd stick to the man like a limpet even if he could never have sex again," Sarah said with conviction.
Zondra was stunned and completely at a loss for words.
"I AM having the time of my live getting the master class from a sex god," Sarah clarified. "But the most important thing is that the person I am around him is the best version of myself."
"So your very un-Walker-like behavior isn't all a result of intersect interrogation?" Zondra asked doubtfully.
"Without Chuck. the intersect would have just made me a more lost and anxious version of the woman I was," Sarah confirmed.
Zondra chewed her lip pensively as she stared at Sarah. Sarah stared back with a faint smile. Finally Zondra shook her head.
"OK, I don't understand it but I'm starting to believe it," she admitted. "So are you coming back to the cottage?"
"Nope," Sarah shook her head. "I'll miss being able to roll out of bed and do a morning run with you. Hell, I'll miss a LOT of things about living with you but Chuck is my home now. I can't see a myself wanting to lay my head down anywhere but next to his."
"No new sanctuary sisters," Zondra said, shaking her head wistfully.
"Want to hear another stranger than fiction true thing?" Sarah asked. "I was enjoying a massage when I told Chuck I didn't want him to close down the sanctuary. I didn't think it was fair to other women."
"You told him you wanted him to keep being a man-whore?" Zondra was incredulous.
"He told me he would leave the sanctuary closed only as long as it took to complete our master class in sex," Sarah nodded. "It took me a minute to realize he fully intended to keep that going for the rest of our lives."
"You lucky bitch," the words spilled from Zondra's lips without conscious thought. There was no anger or jealousy in them, just wonder.
"Don't ask ME how it worked out that way," Sarah shrugged helplessly. "God knows I don't deserve it."
"Maybe not," Zondra allowed. "But if it had to be someone other than me, I'm glad it's you."
"If you're jealous, I get it," Sarah said. "It's a pretty rotten way to repay you for bringing him back into my life.'
Zondra grinned crookedly. "I am a LITTLE jealous," she admitted.
"I'd be willing to ask him to spend all day in bed with you on your birthday and Christmas," Sarah blurted out, shocking herself and covering her mouth with her hands.
"And the weirdness continues," Zondra said, shaking her head. "That's a VERY generous offer but I'd settle for the occasional massage, no happy ending required."
"I have no idea why I said that but I wasn't joking. That's really how grateful I am to you and how much I feel I owe you," Sarah admitted awkwardly. "If you can think a less weird way for me to repay you, just let me know."
Their conversation wound down as they finished their meal. They agreed to meet at the trailhead at 6:30am on weekdays and run together as long as they were both at the estate.
Sarah spent the afternoon at the cottage packing what remained of her things. She felt a bit guilty leaving Zondra to live alone there. Her friend had come to watch over her and by doing so made herself a fugitive. Now that Sarah had found her place in the world Zondra had no life to go back to. On the other hand now that she didn't have to be available to Sarah her options had opened up a bit. She could find a lover and move in with him or her. She could join a secret society of warrior nuns or witches. She could find a sensei and practice some deadly art in a secret mountain retreat in Tibet. Or she could just stay in the cottage and teach at the academy.
By the time Sarah had her small cache of personal effects transferred to Chuck's suite it was almost time for dinner. She took a short break to meditate and center herself in the moment, then headed off to meet Antonia.
"It's wonderful to see you in person at last, Sarah," Antonia greeted her. "Don't sit just yet, please. I want to get a good look at you."
She slowly walked in a circle around Sarah with a critical eye. Sarah had no idea what she was looking for but was content to simply stand and breathe.
"Excellent!" Antonia pronounced her judgement and the both took their seats.
"So what were you looking for?" Sarah asked.
"When you bury feelings, they often get associated with a specific part of the body. Having an interrogator do a close physical examination often makes the muscles in that part of the body twitch. I'm nowhere near as good as Charles is at reading the details but I can usually tell when there's SOMETHING there," Antonia explained.
"So 'excellent' means you didn't see any twitches?" Sarah guessed.
"Just so," Antonia agreed. "It's far from an exact science but I see it as a sign that your personality elements are working together in harmony."
"I'd love to learn more about it," Sarah admitted. Inside she felt an unhealthy eagerness for knowledge. She closed her eyes and did a quick inventory. It was Katie. She saw a whole new way to read a mark. Lisa had a tight grip on her but she was struggling to get free. Sarah suddenly found a trank gun in her hand and put a dart into Katie without a second thought. Reading repressed emotions was still interesting but now the most compelling reason was because it could help people who had a Sam locked away.
"Extraordinary," Antonia looked almost shocked but in a good way. "If you're willing to share I'd love to know what just happened to you."
"I wanted to learn to read like you do but my desire felt... off somehow. I checked my personae and figured out Katie thought learning to read like you would be GREAT for helping her size up a mark. Lisa wasn't going to let her grill you. I tranked Katie and was able to feel Sam's desire to help people who had someone locked away like she used to be," Sarah explained.
Antonia's jaw hung open as Sarah finished her explanation.
"What is it?" Sarah prompted her.
"What you just did is a skill that takes most intersects a lot of work to acquire," Antonia said slowly. "Charles has been working with me for over a year and I don't think I could do what you just did."
"So does that mean I'm an intersect?" Sarah frowned.
"Not really," Antonia clarified. "You've been mapped, which gives your personae definition most people don't have. This allows you to come to a global consensus quickly whereas the normal process might take years and even then it would be more muddy. We wouldn't consider you an intersect unless we had used implantation to add specific information or skills. The 3.0 implantation process is based on the same principles as earlier versions but in a very different way. We layer implants and let them integrate a piece at a time so even though someone with a very limited implant and someone with a spiderweb of them spanning the brain would both technically be 'intersects', the first one would be a lot closer to a non-intersect than to the second."
"I'd be very interested in learning more about the process," Sarah said. "But I'm sure most of the details are restricted to members of Galois Media Special Projects."
"I was actually asking myself how to broach the subject of sponsoring you as a new hire," Antonia laughed softly. "It would be a very serious step for you. You'd have to be willing to put your loyalty to GMSP above any other nation or organization."
"As long as it wouldn't require me to put GMSP above my loyalty to Chuck I don't see an issue there," Sarah replied thoughtfully. "I'm not sure I could ever get to a point where I'd burn Zondra or Carina either."
"You sound very certain," Antonia frowned doubtfully.
"I am," Sarah replied with calm clarity. "Is that so difficult to believe?"
Antonia shook her head in wonder, saying, "A comprehensive review of all your loyalties for potential conflicts would take the most adept of us hours of focused introspection. The only exception is Charles. But I've been watching you closely and there are absolutely no indicators of conflict within you to your statement."
"Isabella was a wonderful guide during my workshop," Sarah shrugged. "And all the sex I had with Chuck helped put me in touch with myself. I'm not sure how else to explain it."
"Don't feel you need to explain it," Antonia assured her. "The hiring process is very simple. You make a statement about who you are and why you want to be part of GMSP and all the members review it. Then we do a team interview where any of us can ask as many questions of you as we like."
"Let me mull it over and sleep on it. Then I can go over my first draft with you tomorrow and you can point out things members might want to know that I haven't covered?" Sarah suggested.
"That sounds like an excellent plan," Antonia nodded.
Antonia still seemed a bit off balance and Sarah wasn't sure what to make of it but as they ate and chatted about less weighty matters she was able to relax. Sarah found herself really enjoying just being with her.
"I just want to let you know how very grateful I am to have you for a godmother," Sarah said solemnly before they parted. "I understand this started with you as Sarah 2.0 and me as Jill 2.0 but I feel nothing but gratitude to you for protecting Chuck and for forcing me to deal with my issues."
"I honestly feel that I've gained an incredible goddaughter who I am completely unworthy of," Antonia admitted. "But I gladly accept your gratitude and promise to do all I can to become worthy."
They embraced with tears in their eyes and held each other for a long moment, communicating in some primordial physical language. Then Sarah innocently kissed Antonia on the lips and actually allowed herself to skip as she made her way back to the suite and her Chuck.