A/N #1: This story contains dialogue from the Chuck episode, "Chuck vs the Other Guy" written by Chris Fedak
A/N #2: Again, not a warning per se, but just a heads up. There are a few vulgarities in this chapter, as well as descriptions in dialogue that allude to assault. Nothing is graphic, and it is only inferred. Just thought it would be prudent to mention.
And if you break down
I will remind you
Of what you were yesterday
You can break down
I'll be behind you
Every day by day by day
"Day by Day"
The Hooters
June 7, 2012
Echo Park, Los Angeles, California
Sarah was in the same spot she had been when Ellie had left to find Chuck, on the edge of the sofa, her knees pulled up to her chest with her arms wrapped tightly around. She was sitting in silence, the television off, no table lamps turned on despite the fading light of the afternoon. Her eyes shifted upward at their entry, a ghost of a smile on her lips, with her lips closed.
Some wordless understanding, a wave of empathy seemed to pass from Sarah to the pair of siblings, from them back to her, and between the two spouses, all at the same time. The evidence of tears on Ellie's cheeks, the drawn look on Chuck's face, told Sarah what they had discussed on their walk. Nothing was said now, but nothing needed to be, not after everything that had already been said.
"Alex and I are cooking, you know, over there," Ellie said, forcing a bright smile on her face. "I can bring something over for you guys later, if you'd like."
"Thanks, El," Chuck said. "I'll text you when we're…ready." He was about to say finished, but had stopped himself. The time in between being finished and being ready to talk to his sister again could be quite some time.
"Excuse me," they heard from behind, from the doorway as the door was still open.
Chuck spun quickly, feeling his heart start to pound. "Dr. Dreyfus," he said. After pausing to collect himself, he added, "This is my sister, Ellie Woodcomb."
"It's nice to meet you, Doctor," Dreyfus said with a stiff smile. "I've studied all the work you've done on the Intersect. It's literally amazing, Doctor."
Ellie seemed embarrassed. "I just wish I could have helped more, you know. Done more for Sarah than I did."
"The techniques you implemented were instrumental in recovering a significant portion of Sarah's memories. And I believe more is possible, and probable, as time progresses," he said.
Ellie smiled again, tapping Chuck on his arm, and then excused herself.
Dreyfus was busy taking off his hat, setting down his bag and getting settled, while Chuck moved to sit beside Sarah. She curled herself into him, twisting her knees so her legs angled across his lap. He wrapped his arm around her, feeling her head nestled against his shoulder. He moved with infinite gentleness, squeezing tighter as she intensified her grip on him, her arm sliding around his waist. He gave her a quick, reassuring glance.
Eventually, Dreyfus sat across from them. He regarded them quietly, thoughtfully, folding his hands together on his lap, covering his notebook. "As I had predicted at the beginning of the psychodynamic therapy, this has become increasingly difficult. Stressful. On both of you. So, before we continue, I need to ask you a few questions, Sarah."
She turned her head to look at the doctor. "Ok," she said softly.
"I'm curious about your fits of anger, Sarah. How frequently do you feel bouts of anger that threaten your equilibrium?" he asked.
She looked at Chuck, as if she were seeking his help in answering. "At least once a day," she mumbled quietly. Chuck nodded once in confirmation. Dreyfus nodded in reply.
"How often are you tempted to express that anger in a way that could bring harm to yourself?" he asked.
"At least twice already," she said quietly. "I feel like I can lose control. I'm not always aware of what I'm doing to myself."
"Are you concerned that you may cause serious harm to yourself?" he asked.
She shook her head, realizing as she answered that the reason she didn't was because she knew Chuck was there to protect her. It was true, although probably not the right way to think, especially when she was trying to lessen his burdens in dealing with all of this. She wasn't sure if she should voice that, but Dreyfus followed up with another question too quickly.
"Are you concerned that you may cause harm to someone else?"
Chuck felt her muscles clench, the rigor in her body glaringly evident. She squeezed him harder around his waist. When he looked at her, he saw her eyes, enormously wide and unblinking. He felt her tension worsen as the time stretched and she didn't answer. Her breath made rattling sounds inside her chest.
"Sarah?" Dreyfus asked gently.
"I almost killed Chuck, before. When I didn't remember," she whispered, her voice meek and unprojected in the room.
"That's not the same," Chuck said intently, raising his voice in emphasis.
She tried twice to answer him before the words formed. "Right. But if…I attacked him, even by accident…I could seriously harm him. And he wouldn't defend himself." She choked, her eyes filling with tears.
Dreyfus saw Chuck's face before he looked away, almost completely overcome with emotion, his eyes filling with tears.
"I'm asking only because, at this juncture, an inpatient stay may facilitate treatment, going forward. It would take some of the constant stress off of you, as a caregiver, Chuck, as well as provide round the clock attention, and protection for both of you," Dreyfus explained, his focus shifting between the two of them as he spoke.
"No!" Chuck shouted, sitting forward. "No, no. I was in that place, damn it. You're not putting Sarah in there." He had startled Sarah, he knew, as he felt her recoil from his forceful outburst.
"That was for treatment's sake, Chuck. At the time, what the CIA thought was necessary," Dreyfus defended calmly.
"If it hadn't been for Sarah and Casey, I would have been killed in there. There's no guarantee that if something happened that it could be prevented, not when there are so many other patients that require constant care like that," Chuck insisted. His nostrils flared as his breathing became labored, struggling to stay composed.
"There are…other assurances," Dreyfus added.
"Like what? A straight jacket?" Chuck shouted angrily. "She's the victim! You aren't locking her up like a criminal!" Sarah had never seen him quite so angry and passionate at the same time. Sarah at least partially understood, recalling the first interaction Chuck had had with Dr. Dreyfus.
Sarah's response to Chuck's adamant pleas was a quiet sentence, rich with sadness and remorse. "If I…could hurt you, then maybe–"
"No!" he shouted again, holding her by her shoulders. He was so fiercely insistent, and yet, his grip was mild, never strong enough to cause her discomfort. "I don't think it's the best thing for you. If this is about protecting you, I'm here. And if it's about protecting me, it doesn't matter."
He saw the terror in her eyes, knew she feared the possibility of hurting him more than any harm she could do to herself. What he feared, more than just what he had expressed to Dreyfus, was the fact that her separation from him would somehow set her back. Dreyfus had already expressed more than once that his presence seemed to be helping. Alone in the hospital, not able to sleep–he couldn't bear the thought.
Dreyfus sighed. "I honestly didn't think I would convince you, Chuck, but I needed to put the option out there. Do you agree with Chuck, Sarah?"
With a tender vulnerability that touched him deeply, Sarah answered, "I don't want to hurt him. At all."
Dreyfus flipped his notebook open, turning to the back page. He scribbled on a piece of paper, then ripped the top page off. He reached over and handed it to Chuck. It was a prescription, written for what looked like a drug called Midazolam. When Chuck looked up, Dreyfus explained. "It's an injectable tranquilizer. Usually indicated before surgery, but it can be used as an emergency sedative for combative patients."
"What do you want me to do with this?" Chuck asked, his voice thick.
"Fill it and keep it here. Just in case. If you think she's becoming a danger to herself, or to you, inject her. It will render her unconscious in about ten seconds," he explained.
"Tranq her? You want me to tranq her?" Chuck said incredulously, disgusted.
"It's nothing like the darts the CIA uses. Midazolam has anti-anxiety and anti-stress properties that most field tranquilizers do not. She'll calm down before she loses consciousness. It's a last resort, of course, but I think it's necessary in case of emergencies." He sighed, his tone changing. "This is the hardest part, Chuck. It will get easier."
He looked down at the prescription, at Dreyfus' messy and uneven handwriting. He couldn't shake the sick feeling at the thought of jabbing her with a huge needle. Drugging her, the same thing that he now knew she had been subjected to while being held captive.
Sarah had to have noticed his face, as she reached for his hand. "It's ok, Chuck," she said softly. "It keeps you safe. That's all that matters to me."
He took her back in his arms, disconcerted that he was this agitated before what promised to be an extremely traumatic session.
XXX
It had taken twice as long for her to achieve the calm and relaxed state required for her to delve into her memories. Dreyfus had suggested she lie down, but she couldn't get comfortable. He continued making suggestions, but the only way she could relax was in physical contact with her husband. She stayed reclining in Chuck's arms, drawing both strength and comfort from the connection.
"Do you remember where you were last time, Sarah?" he asked calmly.
She didn't respond right away. Instead she made a noise, a low moaning sound, grimacing as if she were in pain. "I'm on an airplane," she said, her voice sounding like she was speaking around a mouth full of ground glass. "Blindfolded. Tape over my mouth. My hands are tied behind my back, bound up with my ankles. I feel dizzy, nauseous. Groggy, like I can't think. I hear people talking, but I can't understand what they're saying."
The silence stretched, as the tension built, her muscles hardening under his hands. She swallowed hard, whimpering. "I can feel my clothes and something…is…strange. My…bra is…unhooked. My pants are…crooked. And I feel pain. The inside of my thighs, and my hip joints. But not…not…internally." She felt his arms, even in her dreamlike state, imagining the buffer that could keep her safe as she wandered in the wasteland these memories created.
She breathed deeply, waiting. "I can hear them. We left Japan. He's taking me back to Los Angeles. Plan B, he says. One of them is…him," she spat it out, not saying his name on purpose. "I don't know who he's talking to. He's asking if he had all the necessary information, to make the…stimulus, he called it. He said yes–my dossier, my file, everything in the database. What about the other things? He asks. I added Bartowski's dossier. That should be sufficient to get her where you want her. I realize they don't know I'm conscious. I slow down my breathing, so it doesn't attract attention. I'm trying to figure out what his plan is. But he started talking about Omaha, in that strange sing-song voice. He knew Bryce engineered my transfer." She growled, even as tears started flowing. She started to mimic his voice, quoting him. " She was fucking Larkin. And once he was dead, she started fucking Bartowski. Omaha was mine. She should have been mine." She paused, sobbing harder, struggling to keep her voice from fading away. "The other one says, well, she is now, isn't she? He answers, Once Bartowski is dead. I need her…in working order, first. The other one says, Well then, why did you start?" She choked, twitching, rocking herself hard against Chuck's forearm that stretched across her chest. " X-13, he says. She'll wake up and not remember." She shifted between tenses, retelling and reliving at the same time, Chuck noted. It was always this way when she was explaining to Dreyfus.
She was moaning again, her fingernails jabbing him in the side as she shifted back and forth. "He's touching me again. He surprised me, knowing I'm awake. I feel that mist on my face, the slightly sweet scent. I black out while he's…unzipping my…" The breath went all out of her, and she gasped, trying to breathe again. She shuddered uncontrollably.
"Ssh," Chuck whispered against her cheek, just below his chin. He was tender, gentle with her, even as a white hot rage threatened to burst him from the inside out. Chuck believed in mercy, he honestly did. But there was no part of him left that felt that was absolute, that it could be given without consideration. This had changed him, he thought sadly. There was no room for any of that, not for such a sadistic animal who had repeatedly violated his wife in such a grisly way.
Dreyfus stayed silent for a very long time, listening to Sarah cry. It had started to irritate Chuck, as time seemed to drag on. What purpose was there for him to sit there, watching him cradling his wife in his arms while she cried, terrorized by thought of heinous crimes committed against her? When he finally spoke, Chuck realized he just had important deductions to make, information to impart. He was just waiting until their heads cleared enough to absorb it.
"He was speaking about the three dimension fractals, from what you described," Dreyfus said.
"The what?" Chuck asked.
Dreyfus turned to Chuck, speaking with a patience one would reserve for a child. "The torture, Chuck. He devised a way to force the Intersect to fire on demand, by looking at three dimensional images. He also found a way to take factual information–Sarah's file, your file, and translate it to that matrix. Her memories were removed. Deliberately and precisely."
It was what Sarah had alluded to, coming awake from sleep walking. It only fueled the wrath beneath the surface of his skin, ever so close to erupting forth.
"And the other portions, where he just wanted you to forget the progression of events, because he had no fractals for that type of information present in your memory, he used X-13, which induces 24 to 48 hours of memory loss. He very likely overdosed you on it, which just erased it all."
"Only X-13 doesn't work as well as all that, right? Morgan remembered after he was dosed, Jeff and Lester remembered even after multiple doses. That's why she can remember this, right?" Chuck asked, his words running together as he spoke.
"It is true X-13 never worked as well in the field as it did in trials, that's correct, Chuck," Dreyfus concluded.
"Dossier information," Sarah said, her voice harsh in her raw throat. "Factual information only, right?"
"Exactly, Sarah," Dreyfus said, a soft smile on his weathered face. "The emotions you described, those were real. Unaffected by that. There was no way he could remove feelings from you. The X-13 made you forget those feelings, because the accompanying memories were gone. But the emotions came back first. They were just overwhelming, frightening to someone who had always prided herself on her ability to not feel. Right, Sarah?"
"I always loved him," she whispered, a hushed and amazed wonder in her tone.
"Yes, Sarah, you did," Dreyfus told her confidently.
XXX
Sarah stood alone in the shower, letting the water beat against her face, wash over her, rinsing the soap from her body. She closed her eyes, opening her mouth, tasting the bitterness of the soap in the water as it splashed her lips and into her mouth.
She had spent over an hour resting against Chuck, after Dreyfus had departed. There were no more tears, just an empty, bottomless pit inside her. It was looming, threatening to suck her down into its inky depths. But still, those arms around her, would not let her go. He was strong enough to hold her, even when all her strength had gone.
She needed the warm water to calm her, relax her aching muscles. So badly, she hadn't communicated to Chuck what he should do. And she knew, because of that, he was waiting to enter the bathroom.
"Chuck!" she yelled at the top of her lungs, hoping he could hear through the door and with the rushing sound of the water.
He came in too quickly, obviously worried something had happened. She turned to regard him through the fogged glass. "Just brush your teeth," she yelled, again so he could hear her.
She missed the hand he placed to his chest, trying to calm his pounding heart. He nodded silently, turning away. He started to get ready for bed, and soon she was beside him, wrapped in her towel, standing at the sink without the mirror. Chuck had called the apartment maintenance supervisor, and they were due tomorrow to replace the glass. She had to lean across his line of sight, to check her teeth in his mirror.
That was when he saw it, something so small he would never have known it was there had he not been keyed in to look for it. A tiny white scar, the size of a pencil tip, just under her ear on her neck.
Caused by the knife held to her throat, he knew. How many other scars were on her body now, that he didn't know about? He had described her scars to her as a way to prove to her she had trusted him enough to tell him as much as she had. The more she told him, the more he would notice, connecting back to all that had happened to her. Scars she would have all her life, inside and out. His anger threatened to return, but he pushed it aside. Everyone had scars. Scars were caused by life. Living meant accepting that, thriving despite them.
He bent to dry his face, pulling the towel away to see her, leaning towards him. She kissed him, more than a peck, savoring the softness of his lips and the minty scent of his toothpaste as it gently burned inside her nostrils. He kissed her in return, multiple gentle kisses against her mouth and her cheek.
He pulled her closer, ending the kiss. He towered over her as she stood there in her bare feet. Did he know how much she loved that? The way he looked down at her, through his eyelashes. His eyes were beautiful, more so with the knowledge that their true color was only apparent from very close, like she stood now. It was like a secret only she knew.
"Chuck, why did it bother you so much, what Dreyfus said?" she asked.
He glanced away, but focused on her face again quickly. "Because you being here with me makes you feel better, doesn't it?" he asked honestly.
"It does," she admitted. "But I couldn't live with myself if I hurt you again–"
"Don't worry about me, ok?" he asked her. "I want you to heal from this. To be able to sleep without nightmares. To function again and not be afraid. He agreed technically you are better with me than in the hospital."
She rested her head on his shoulder, feeling the tender warmth of his hands on the skin on her back. She would always worry about him. There was nothing she could do to make herself stop. She wanted him to sleep through the night, exercise, eat a full meal, and be able to enjoy himself in the things that he loved.
She just hoped there was a way to achieve both goals at the same time.
XXX
"Sarah, do you love me?"
She felt her heart almost stop beating, aware of the feeling of her blood surging through her veins like never before. So strange, she thought it that split second. She knew nothing of love, nothing at all, but she knew enough to know this wasn't the way people told each other. They proclaimed it. Risked it all, and blurted it out. Part trust, part hope, but always a risk. She lived her life in constant danger, but somehow, that risk had always been too great. Easier to leave it a mystery, never letting her true intentions be known.
Easier for her. But so much harder on him. The way to love someone was to put them before yourself, to care for them completely. Chuck had always done so, transparently displaying his emotions. He was asking. Because he honestly wasn't sure. After all of it, everything they had been through. And he didn't know. She had listened to him, not answered him after he had boldly proclaimed his feelings to her. He had done that bravely–taking the largest risk of all, because he honestly didn't know the answer.
What did she know of love? She asked herself again. What Chuck had shown her, everyday. Risking his life for her, putting her safety above his own, her happiness above his own. She loved him, of course she loved him. She had always loved him.
Thinking so hard, this way, she had actually missed him speaking again. He was rambling, embarrassed, his cheeks flushing red. He was laughing nervously, though she could hear the underlying sadness in the tone.
"Yes," she said, hearing the word echo, feeling as if she had walked through a doorway into a different world.
Her adrenaline surged as she forced herself to look up. He was still rambling. She had waited too long, and he had thought she had answered some other question she hadn't paid attention to.
"No, Chuck. Yes," she said again, looking at him.
His mouth hung open. "Wha…what?" He could hardly speak, and she thought it was the most adorable thing she had ever seen. She had left him thunderstruck. He was in disbelief. He had asked, because he didn't know.
Just to make sure he knew exactly what she meant she added, "I fell for you a long, long time ago. After you fixed my phone and before you started defusing bombs with computer viruses. So, yes. Yes."
She woke up in the darkness of their bedroom, warm on the inside from her memory mined from her dream. She turned only slightly, looking for Chuck in the darkness. He was asleep, turned away from her, his body tucked against hers as she slept at his back with her arm across his waist.
He was asleep, and she knew how badly he needed it. He was twitching, obviously disturbed by a troubling dream. The line that tended to bulge on his forehead when he was straining or in pain was prominent. Ever so lightly, she placed her hand on his forehead, threading her fingers into his hair. Gently stroking his head, she watched the line disappear, watching all of his features relax. He stopped twitching, sighing and shuddering in his sleep, as he settled. She reached around and rested her hand on the center of his chest, snuggling up to his back.
There was so little she could do for him, as he put all of his effort in taking care of her, dealing with his anguish secondarily to ensure she was alright. If she could offer this minor comfort, to hold him this way, so that he could stay asleep, she relished the opportunity.
He slept through the night with her arms around him.