A/N Here we are, the final chapter, with a good bit of wrap-up all around.


"The director will see you now."

Daniel Shaw rose from his seat in the elegantly appointed waiting room of the Director of National Intelligence, the man to whom Langston Graham reported. He carried his briefcase, containing a short and useless precis of the events in Hungary, should it be asked for. If more was needed, he could always say he had a team looking into it further, and he'd even be telling the truth.

For once.

The door to the DNI's office was as heavy as the door to Graham's, but the view was better. Inside the room, Shaw had hoped to see his boss sitting submissively on the other side of the desk, but both Graham and Graham's boss were sitting in the more comfortable part of the office. "Ah, Shaw," said the boss. "Come in, sit down."

Daniel obeyed, like a dutiful subordinate. There was a coffee service on the table, but no one offered him any. He wasn't known to be a coffee drinker, anyway.

"Now," said his boss' boss, "Let me hear what you have to report about these events in Hungary, and I hope it will be more satisfying than what Director Graham had to say on the same topic." He frowned at the offending party.

"Certainly, sir," said Shaw, fully prepared to throw his entire Hungary team under the bus, and he did so. Since most of them were either dead or in prison, this didn't matter much, but it sounded good, and substantial. "I have an elite team in Hungary now, digging deeper."

"Excellent," said the DNI, but he didn't ask for the list of names, of the members of that team. "We need to get to the bottom of this fulcrum business post haste."

"Yes, sir," said Daniel Shaw. "Wait..."

"Wait for what, Daniel?" asked Graham. "For news of the events in California to cross my desk? It already has, along with a good bit of additional information about your little secret society. Unfortunately for you it didn't go through any of the normal channels, the ones you have tapped." Graham smiled. "The nerd is really very gifted." The office door opened, two somber and official-looking men standing just outside. "Goodbye, Daniel."

"But sir-"

"Post haste, Mr. Shaw," said the DNI, waving the two officers into the room, "Post haste."

"Fools," said Shaw, leaping to his feet, "You'll get nothing from me." He clenched his jaw, went into convulsions, and died. The advancing guards got on their communicators for a medical team.

"Interesting," said Graham, standing up for a better look.

"What is?" asked his boss, also getting up but going around the far side of both the table and Graham, without looking.

"I didn't know Daniel Shaw could smile," said Graham, in a bit of gallows humor. "Nice to know I was wrong."

"Hmph," snorted the DNI. "Very funny." They moved to the desk as a team came in to remove the body. "Tell me about this 'nerd'. Who is he?"

Graham gave Shaw's body a last look. "A Fool's Trap, sir."


At about the same time, but three time zones away...

Chuck sat at the Nerd Herd desk, staring out at the floor of the Buy More. Clean. Polished. He could smell the sealant from the new glass in the HT Room doors.

It was creepy. "How are things outside?"

"Poppy's happy," said Morgan, coming to stand in his usual place with his usual lack of posture.

"Of course she is," said Chuck. "She turned a lunch at the Buy More into an outdoor all-you-can-eat fest."

"And best of all, Harry's still unconscious." Morgan saw motion by the break room door. "Or not." They walked over to the green-shirted man, currently sliding slowly down the wall with a vacant smile on his face. "Harry, what's wrong?"

"Oh nothing, I'm just fine," he mumbled.

Chuck for one didn't believe him. "Harry?"

"No, I mean it. Everything's lovely. Everything's okey-dokey."

"Poppy?" asked Morgan.

"Poppy," said Chuck.

They took his arms and lifted him up again, steering him toward the doors. "Oh, look, a party," Harry said. "For me?"


A day later...

"The Director will see you now."

Anna Wu, dressed in her finest and most formal clothes, picked up her case and rose from her seat. The boss' door was heavy, probably armored, but the view on the far side was very nice. "Come in, agent," he said, before she could gawk too noticeably. "Sit down."

Her boss' office, apart from the view, was fairly ordinary, furnished with varying levels of comfort depending on the visitor and the purpose. She walked up to his desk and sat in a mostly-functional chair, a dutiful subordinate. She even sat at attention, although that might have been the outfit.

Graham gave her a large portion of his attention. "What have you got for me?"

Agent Wu opened her case and reached inside, brushing her fingers over a small stuffed bear before lifting out a phone, which she set on the desk. "I was told to put this into your hands and no others, sir."

Graham made no move to touch it. "Told by whom?"

Agent Wu set her case on the floor. "She was going under an alias, but she said her real name was Jenny Burton, and that she was an agent with the CIA."

Graham entered the name in his computer, and pulled up the file, including the picture. He turned the monitor so Wu could see it.

"Yes, that's her, except the hair. She was blonde."

He pulled the monitor back around, and called up Burton's work history. "Stationed in... Hungary." He smiled. "I'll be damned."

"Sir?"

"Nothing." His voice hardened, just a bit. "So, a deep cover agent in Hungary, her finger on the pulse of the nation, knows everything that matters, and she just miraculously shows up in Los Angeles and hands the case of a lifetime to you."

Agent Wu squirmed in her seat. "No, sir."

"No?" Graham waved a hand at the phone. "Do you know what's on that?"

"No, sir," said Anna. "Agent Burton had given the phone to one Charles Bartowski, a tech specializing in phone repairs at the Burbank Buy More, and had him open it for her."

Graham looked unhappy. "So this phone technician knows what's on here? A nerd at a Buy More in LA knows all our secrets?"

"No, sir. I was there when he opened the phone. I made sure he looked at nothing. He copied the files as Agent Burton had told him to do, sent them to you using an address she had given him, and re-locked the phone with a code only you would know. Agent Burton's birthday, in European format, with dashes. I took the phone from him."

He made a mental note, for later. "And where was Agent Burton during all this?"

"I don't know, sir. She'd met with Mr. Bartowski, and passed him the phone under the pretense of a dinner with his family, and sex afterward."

"Not a seduction, then," said Graham.

"No, sir. It seems she really liked him. He said she left some time after that, convinced she was being followed. She was supposed to meet him at the Buy More that morning, but she never showed."

"Did you see her leave?"

"No, sir, I didn't, but we were on the lookout for threats incoming, such as the attempt on Mr. Bartowski's life that same night. Possibly that's what spooked her into leaving."

"The same time Bryce was attacked..."

"Just after, sir."

"Do you believe in coincidence, agent?"

Anna Wu blinked once, her face perfectly calm. "Sometimes, sir. Not often." Serendipity was a different story.

"Neither do I," said Graham. He stood up, taking the phone and locking it in a drawer of his desk. "We're going to go over to that table, get some coffee, or in your case tea, and you're going to tell me everything, from the top."


The next day...

Ellie Bartowski answered a knock on the door. Her brother was there, holding hands-Again? Still?-with Sarah.

"Hey El," he said, as they came in and got comfortable. "Guess what I'm going to do."

"Trim your hair?" asked Ellie.

"Nope," said Sarah, brushing her free fingers through it.

"Then I give up," said Ellie.

"I'm going to leave the Buy More-"

Squee!

"I'm going to finish my degree-"

Squee!

"And I'm going to get a better job. I've already got one lined up, in cyber-security."

Squee!

"But first-"

"First?"

"Running the Nerd Herd desk by myself was a load, but we've some new guys on loan until we can get some new hires in. Morgan doesn't need me there anymore-"


Smash cut to the Buy More...

Morgan, wearing the suit and nameplate of the assistant manager, called, "Harry?"

Harry Tang, wearing a somewhat more vacant expression than the other greenshirts, shuffled over. "Yes, Mr. Grimes, sir?"

"There's a truck in the loading dock, Harry. Go help unload." Morgan gripped Harry's shoulders, turned him in the right direction, and gave him a gentle push. Harry shuffled away, as Morgan turned to his boss. "I'll be glad when they start with the lower dosages."

"I don't know," said Big Mike. "I like him better the way he is, now that he's stopped screaming at random intervals."

Morgan shrugged. "True."


Smash cut back to Echo Park...

"-so Sarah and I are going on a little vacation."

Not squee. "How little?"

"Until the heat cools down around here," said Sarah. "Shouldn't need to be more than a couple of days. We'll be close enough no one will think he's trying to run away, but far enough that no one is actually going to want to bother him. By the time we get back they should have all the answers they need."


"The Director will see you now."

The two people sitting in the chairs in the outer office got up and walked into Graham's domain, one opening the door with a familiar hand.

"Bryce!" said Graham with some degree of pleasure. He got up and met them halfway. "Welcome back. I was beginning to wonder if maybe you'd found the love of your life in Los Angeles and planned to stay."

Bryce smiled. "Not at all, sir. You know I live for the game."

"But you did find someone in LA," said Graham, looking at Bryce's companion.

"Yes, sir. May I introduce Miss Alexandra Forrest. Alex, this is my boss, Langston Graham, director of the CIA."

"Sir." She held out a hand.

"Welcome." He led them to one of the more social settings in his office. "I admit I was worried, Agent Larkin, after Agent Wu told me about the state of your hotel room."

"Not as worried as I was, I'll bet, being attacked by a rogue agent with a civilian in the room."

"You knew he was an agent?"

"Sure, I was there when you gave him an assignment a while back. Kieran Ryker. He tossed the room while we were out. Waited for us to come back when he didn't find what he was looking for."

"His phone," said Graham. "We have it. We'll discuss it later. My two agents have been promoted for their quick thinking and handling of a complex issue."

"I'm glad, sir. You gave me the option of 'trap' over 'hook' and I briefed the team accordingly."

"You did a good job. Rye asked for a transfer to PsyOps, and Wu asked to be transferred to LA, don't ask me why."

"She'll fit in there better than Eastern Europe," said Bryce.

"True." Graham turned to Miss Forrest. "You must have had quite a time of it."

"It was a shock, I'll admit, but my father was Baltimore Police. We heard stories, took some training. I think the bigger shock was finding out Bryce was a Federal agent."

"You've had training?" Graham sounded interested.

"Unofficially. It started out as little 'games' when we were young, got more advanced as we got older. I was the only one of us who stuck with it."

"She was a real asset against Ryker, sir. He didn't know what hit him."

"Neither did you," said Alex.

"Let me guess," said Graham. "He treated you like a civilian."

Alex smiled. "Only once."

"Have you considered coming to work for us?" asked Graham. "We can always use people with your demonstrated spirit and talent."

"I am now," said Miss Forrest.

"We have an internal investigative branch where I think you'll fit right in." Graham turned back to Bryce. "You haven't asked about your friend."

Bryce slumped a bit, looking down. "I'm not sure 'friend' is the right word..."

"I think you'd be surprised, especially now."

Bryce looked up. "Wu and Rye took care of him?"

"Excellent care, and he's now safe under the watchful eye of Agent Burton, who calls herself Sarah Walker."

Bryce frowned. "I don't understand. Why would you be keeping an eye on Chuck?"

"I'm not, exactly, but why wouldn't I?" asked Graham. "He's skilled, clever, honest, and resourceful, as well as kind, sweet, generous, caring, charming, considerate, loyal-"

"Ah," said Bryce, "She's in love with him."

"In a nutshell. Wu tried to sell me a sob story about a missing agent, but when a Buy More dropout suddenly goes on vacation with a blonde bombshell I can read between the lines. This Bartowski must be a hell of a man."

"He is, sir."

"I'm glad you think so, because when he gets back from that vacation, I want you to contact him, both of them. Make an offer. I think they handled themselves pretty well."


A/N2 In the movie just about everyone died, on both sides. Here I limited the casualties to the only people no one would care about.

I was a bit hung up on whether and how Sarah would leave the CIA for Chuck, fake her death, etc. Anna tried, but Graham saw through it and was happy with that status quo.

The teddy bear in the briefcase is a 'blink and you'll miss it' call-back to Morgan's little bear that he won at the arcade. She saved him from Vincent and he gave it to her as a thank you present. He is perhaps a part of the reason she's transferring to LA. Maybe.


End credits scene...

"I'm so glad I didn't have to try to get Chuck a girlfriend this time around," said Ellie.

"So am I," said Sarah. "Too bad Morgan couldn't make it."

"Yeah, too bad," said Ellie neutrally. "I hear he's got a girlfriend now. I haven't met her."

"First I'm hearing of it. He didn't say anything when he dropped off his present."

"Gee, let me think," said Ellie.

Sarah laughed. "Yes, it's that new LazerBitch knockoff, although it's getting some pretty good reviews. The cover art, especially. Apparently their manager cosplays as the title character so they used her as the model. He even managed to get it signed by the creators, a group calling themselves Jeffster Productions."

Ellie sprayed wine all over the room, and sat forward, coughing.

"You okay?" asked Sarah.


A/N3 Okay, we're done now.