In this short story, I once fabulated how Chuck&Sarah would probably end up in the future. Here is my idea about it. I am glad about every voice to it. I originally wrote the story in German and translated it into English. I hope I succeeded. I apologize for any linguistic errors. I was inspired by the wistful as well as conciliatory sounding music Michael E - Conversations, which can be found in two versions (Original + Chill) on YouTube and Cyra Morgan - If we stay (Moonlight Remix) with the great song lyrics that seemed fitting to me.

Chuck versus death.

Sometime in the distant future.

A 72-year-old woman named Sarah settled down on the bench and contemplated the scenery. In the morning, when the sun was rising, the place was especially beautiful. She enjoyed the silence, broken only by the lively chirping of birds.

She rarely came here, in fact only once a year. Chuck had never liked cemeteries. "They're places where people get depressed and sad. Where people have all kinds of nonsense going through their heads about whether or not they did everything right. Should I go before you Sarah, promise me not to grieve and go to nice and pleasant places; with family or friends that are fun and spread good vibes. The memory is the best thing to keep of the other you loved..."

Chuck's urn grave lay at her feet, next to that of his parents Stephen and Mary Bartowski. It was plain and simple, as they had always kept private in their lives. Beneath his year of birth and death were engraved only two words in large letters, which she had determined to be so when she went to the stone mason:

MY CHUCK

Nothing more. Underneath there was enough empty space for herself, if she should pass away. She was still undecided what should be written there in case of her death. But she wanted to do that today, she resolved.

In her former agent life she always had to fool people with expensive cars and exciting clothes, but in her innermost being she had been rather simple and boring. She had been nothing, just a beautiful shell who had only learned things like lying, camouflaging, deceiving and killing. A temporary shadow traveling, camping in hotels with false identities and resumes. Emotions and empathy atrophied; they were even a hindrance in the performance of her agent job. A social cripple. Until Chuck involuntarily entered her life because she was assigned to him as a chaperone. He managed, with a lot of patience and love, to completely turn her around and integrate her socially and familially and provide her with a sense of security.

She herself came from a lower middle class family and hated pomp and ostentation. The parents quarreled, the father a cheat and an impostor. A small house with a red door and a classic picket fence - simple and cozy, that was her dream, she had once confessed to Chuck in the bedroom when she thwarted his plans with erotic sophistication to look for an expensive mansion. They had both fulfilled that dream, too.

She herself came from a lower middle class family and hated pomp and show-off. A small house with a red door and a classic picket fence - simple and cozy, that was her dream, she had once confessed to Chuck in the bedroom when she thwarted his plans with erotic sophistication to look for an expensive mansion. They had both fulfilled that dream, too.

Chuck had proven a golden nose with the idea of starting the Carmichael cyber-security company. The industry was booming like crazy and both are overwhelmed with orders. In the company compound they bought out, they recreated an exact replica of Echo Park (called Carmichael Park), including fountains, nice seating and "Morgan doors." It had been a beautiful and fun time working with everyone together. Only Casey, who also did jobs for the NSA on the side, remained a free agent, called in whenever things got dicey. Carina and Zondra were also involved in delicate missions. This was always the case when Sarah needed help, as she had a private security-team running on the side and complemented Chuck's cyber structure superb. After the founder's death, she sold the company and paid all the employees (Alex, Morgan, Jeff and Lester, whose singing careers didn't last long) a generous severance package plus monthly pension payments, which the new owners were contractually obligated to pay, plus a life estate in Carmichael Park. Devon's family also lived in the park. This kept everyone close and friendly united. Although Casey, Morgan and Jeff had since passed away, the illustrious group never diminished as adolescent children filled the gaps.

Both of their only children, a girl - Chuck insisted on the name Sarah - worked in management for a well-known cosmetics company in Singapore, their adopted child Molly as a lab technician in Los Angeles. It had always been funny in the house when Chuck called for Sarah and both answered at the same time, so he had to quickly distinguish one as "tiny Sarah" and his wife as "big Sarah." She had been happy to return to work after Sarah was born. She just wasn't born to be a stay-at-home mom and felt like a tiger in a cage. Chuck was as empathetic as ever, insisting that three women were quite enough for his well-being. At Thanksgiving, Christmas, or the occasional barbecue party, everyone always came together to celebrate lavishly and everyone was happy and welcome. Those had been beautiful and unforgettable years. Until that day…

She remembered well the moment when she found her Chuck dead in front of the PC. In her dream house. The flickering screen was writing endless lines with the four

44444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444444

...

while lying with his upper body and head on the keyboard, quite peaceful with closed eyes, as if sleep had overtaken him. The coffee cup was still warm. This had happened to him several times before. But this time it was different. She had sensed it instinctively as she set down the grocery bags in the kitchen and missed his greeting calls.

"Chuck?" was all she had called out. When he didn't answer, her hand automatically sought the loaded pistol in the sideboard drawer. She could just smell the tense atmosphere. Her gut feeling rarely proved her wrong. At gunpoint, she suspiciously approached his workroom.

For months he had been working on the rough draft of a book about her adventures of exciting and dangerous agent life. She knew some passages from it and thought herself too heroically portrayed, like a Marvel character of a fiercely invincible superspy. „Remember the song by The Cabs: You were the Lady with the Shotgun, weren't you?", he teased her in response, which she didn't like to hear because that circumstance had led to almost killing the fascinating man. Chuck himself underpinned himself too much between the lines, which she often criticized. He liked to blame his abilities on the Intersect in his head, which was, of course, complete nonsense in her eyes. "Chuck, don't make yourself smaller than you are!" she would often scold him, tugging at his hair or biting his ear. "We never would have gotten this far without you. We could have done it all only together: Team Bartowski!" Their discussions had always been passionate and cordial, and sometimes Morgan or Ellie would join them when they visited. It was interesting to learn how they saw things then, what they felt or thought.

As she bent over the motionless Chuck, gently shaking him – „Chuck, are you okay?" - and feeling his neck pulse, she knew immediately how he was. Despite the age, he still carried his funny eye wrinkles, snub nose and mischievous expression. She silently stepped back and leaned against the doorframe. Her hand always crept along her neck during emotional outbursts, covering her mouth as tears came. He had died like a nerd. Like maybe he had always wanted to. Death was a familiar comrade to her. Many times she had faced it, eliminated enemies and seen corpses. That it now hit her beloved, she took in silent despair.

Her grief had been short and intense. Chuck would not have wanted her to melt into grief. She knew that. It was also a great consolation that her beloved husband was spared a lot: Again and again, specialists had predicted cerebral problems in old age for the Intersect wearer during regular check-ups, which was already visible in the MRI due to the permanent stress in the brain. The sword of Damocles hung constantly over his head and Chuck suspected it, suppressed this fact with gallows humor. Headaches had plagued him frequently in recent years, which he could only eliminate with strong painkillers. He never spoke about it. An intracranial brain hemorrhage caused his rapid death. Chuck was spared long suffering due to dementia, Alzheimer's or impending stupor, for which Sarah thanked fate.

She looked up at the sky, where a buzzard was meowing and circling. Well, she wouldn't have begrudged Chuck that anyway. As a former agent, she was in possession of fast-acting poison, a crystalline tasteless substance that was instantly lethal. Without suffering, without pain, he would have gone from her. She would have administered it to him without qualms, to let Chuck go as she had known and loved him. Never would she allow her Chuck to deteriorate into a human wreck. He didn't deserve that. They both agreed and knew where the poison was deposited. Just in case, even if something bad were to happen to herself.

"You'll get it right, Sarah. You'll pick the right time. I couldn't think of a more beautiful angel of death! I would do it too if you were...". He didn't say it and swallowed hard at this idea. It was spared her dear Chuck. This highly educated sweet guy, whom Casey had initially disparagingly called a jerk and whom everyone - including herself! - had severely underestimated. She didn't deserve him at all. She had never been more wrong than in her assessment of her dear Chuck. It wasn't until Shaw showed up that she finally confessed for Chuck. She wiped her eyes, moved. Much too late. So much torment because of a inhuman spy ethics.

One night they were talking about D-day and how they could cheat the Reaper. In discussing suicide, he chose almost the same wording as when he was to be placed in preventive custody and once asked Sarah on the helipad, "I want you to go to Ellie, and Morgan, and my friends...and tell them, I don't know...if they think I'm really dead, tell them that it'll really make me feel better...make sure they know how much I love them. You can do that, right? Yes, you can do it, you can handle anything!"

After this high sign of confidence that good Chuck gave her as a cold-blooded agent and assassin, tears spontaneously came to her eyes at that time. She was on the verge of forcing the CIA official at gunpoint to release Chuck...or shoot him. Yes, she would have done that to spare him isolation. Chuck would have died without family and friends like a plant without water, of that she was sure.

Unfortunately, the last chapters were missing, especially the dark episode about Nicholas Quinn, which she didn't like to think about. At first she struggled with simply putting the manuscript in the safe until she died, then she decided to finish it with Morgan. He had finally propped Chuck up in the dark days of her wickedness, for he was on the verge of giving himself up, Morgan had reluctantly revealed to her. For Morgan and his family she had provided, they should never suffer hardship. Chuck's bearded friend died of a heart attack in front of the TV screen 14 months later. He had determined that his "carbon stardust" should lie next to Chuck. Mother Earth would reunite them someday, Morgan fantasized, when Earth one day burned up from the sun and its dust condensed back into a planet. "Imagine that, dude, wouldn't that be great?" Sarah found this infantile view typical of Morgan and smirked at the thought. Despite his simplicity, he had been a wise man. Hadn't he also advised her empathetically during the rescue operation in Thailand, when she stood helplessly before the comatose Chuck? And that amusingly stupid idea of the magic kiss: Wasn't it the inital spark for her to finally start a new beginning?It was balm to her soul.

Soul? She didn't believe in all that religious frippery. Like Chuck, she was humanistic by logical expertise. But with the scientific side, she was in tune with everything returning to its origins. In any case, Alex had granted Morgan's wish, and Sarah had a good view of both graves from the bench. At first, she hadn't taken Morgan in stride, finding him a quirky and odd character who constantly straddled her legs when it came to Chuck. Her arrogant attitude toward Morgan stopped Chuck emphatically polite, but not without a side blow:

"You have no idea what he means to me Sarah... Morgan was there when my mom disappeared...and my dad...He was there...Morgan is more than just my best friend; he is my family! Before you showed up, but certainly after you disappeared...Morgan is my family!"

She had defended her words, but was inwardly ashamed of her disrespectful behavior. At the time she didn't know anyone in Burbank, she had to be reserved as a professional agent, constantly keeping Chuck at arm's length and secretly jealous of Morgan, who had been Chuck's friend since their childhood. That he would soon enrich her team and play a significant role in her relationship with Chuck, she could not have guessed at that stage. Oh, she had made so many mistakes. Chuck had forgiven her time and time again...

Morgan, along with Ellie and Devon, took care of her spouse as Chuck's closest friend, his feet literally pulled out from under him as she, Sarah, strained like a remote-controlled android to kill her own lover. Water welled up in her eyes as she thought of the yawning abyss where Quinn had thrown her in.

The way she constantly pummeled dear Chuck, trying to bomb him away or stab him during their home spa massage, she could never forgive herself. Others did, but she chastised herself with her unfortunate outrage. She had pushed him forward mercilessly, even though he didn't resist, and beaten him down the stairs. Not enough, he also intercepted the bullet that was meant to kill her! That Chuck survived was only due to his padded clothing. She even grabbed Chuck's sister Ellie to get her hands on him. Her breath caught in her sobs. This was bottom of the barrel and demonically evil. Only hardened, nefarious, hired killers do that! A killer like she was! Oh Chuck! One thing the nefarious act had done, though, was kick off a lot of memories and feelings. The carving in the wooden beam hit her like a wet washcloth to the face. As Chuck lay on the floor, she bent over him as a matter of course and asked him if he was all right. She had often said that caringly on their missions together when he was down and writhing in pain.

Casey had crisply literally blown the naked truth in her face in the hotel room while she packed her bags and was about to flee head over heels. He only did that when the cabin was on fire. She couldn't look anyone in the eye anymore, least of all Chuck! And she was going to kill Nicholas Quinn!

From the surprise admission of her infatuation to the fierce crush on Chuck, her simple memorandum on video cemented her remorse. She could well remember sinking deep into the mud with shame. Quinn's psychic rape by erasing her memories turned into agony. Even nastier: In the video recording, she tormented herself. The evidence was served ice cold by Sarah for Sarah! Once hell and back! She broke down and even stood in front of the open window to kill herself. But only Quinn stopped her. He wasn't going to get off so cheaply. My life for revenge, it flashed through her. What had he done to her, to destroy her life and Chuck's...?

That Chuck could forgive her for these acts and never reproached her was...was...she couldn't find the words for it. When she approached Chuck about it once, he just said with a smile, "Call it weakness, Sarah. I always got weak with you. I could never stop loving you." She was so touched that she quickly pushed him into the bedroom, cuddling him, and threw a skillful jointlock onto the bed.

Guilty and dirty, that's how she felt at the time, when she went to see him after their nightly discussion. She literally stood naked in front of him, in sackcloth and ashes, to apologize to him, looking terrible with her teary, puffy eyes and bloated face. If there had been a mouse hole, she would have fit in it! But wasn't she Sarah Walker, the agent? She still possessed a scraped together remnant of size and humbled to talk it out with Chuck. She needed to tell him succinctly why she had to go. She would not be able to survive an extended conversation. She lacked the strength to do that, which she needed to settle the score with Quinn.

But she couldn't help but still throw him a shy flirty smile as a hidden sign not to give up on her completely. She loved him so much, after all, but she really wanted to do this thing alone, not endanger him again. An escort was out of the question. Therefore, she could not get involved in a discussion with him, which she was guaranteed to lose. She had thought this through and could never forgive herself if Chuck had come to harm again in tracking down Quinn. She would rather perish in the process herself with lofty intentions. She was only a spy, after all...

A mysterious longing pushed her back to the Buy More, where it had all begun, after the failed attempt to get Quinn. She remembered again, even donning her same clothes as when they first met to pick up more memory shivers. Her tough attitude escaped like air from a balloon. She didn't even dare touch the customer bell at the nerd counter, so familiar did the scene seem. Like a schoolgirl, she stood shyly in front of Chuck as he greeted her in surprise, stammering, with his big puppy eyes and the old badge with that horrible photo. But she could barely keep up with the growing shred of memory. The puzzle confused her, and through the events she couldn't manage to put them together calmly. Everyone meant well, but it only put her into stress, endless brooding and panic. The idea with the Demova virus had come to her spontaneously, because she had probably successfully handled a similar situation with Chuck at some point.

At the team resolution - the team's last day together - she deliberately put on a striking red and black costume. Red was the color of blood, guilt and atonement. Black represented grief and loss. She immediately took all the blame for causing the end of the team. In order not to pass out or vomit, she had swallowed some sedatives beforehand. Still, during Beckmann's video conference, she hid her hands under the tabletop because her fingers moved nervously like worms in a bait box. And like tough paste, she rose from her chair long after Chuck had left the room to farewell Casey. She just needed time to think it all over. Running away was no longer an option for her. She needed rest and...Chuck. When he approached her again to say goodbye, she abruptly hoped he would take her in his arms and nothing more. She would have stayed. The strong-acting pills acted heavily and prevented her from thinking clearly. Breathing heavily as she turned at the stairs, she tilted her head to show the vulnerable side of her neck and silently begged him with moist eyes, "Just take me in your arms and forgive me! Take the burden off me." But the stupid guy just stood frozen and clenched his fists sadly. Chuck, you dear stupid idiot. Why didn't you comfort me and just hold me and stop me from running away? The wonderful oddball still didn't know the silent language of women, but rather the algorithm of bits and bytes of computer codes.

On Malibu Beach, she sat confused for hours, looking out to sea. She was mad at Chuck. Why hadn't he taken her in his arms in the bunker when she felt the need? Instead, he clumsily stammered stupid stuff like he used to in his early days as a nerd. She remembered exactly what her confusing head was telling her: Such a stupid guy! No idea about women. Where the hell is he? If he really knew me, he'd know where I was now and come get me. What is Chuck waiting for…

She clearly heard his footsteps when he appeared after all. She was inwardly happy and full of expectation. At the same time, she knew she had to make a start, to forge a new tender bond of love. His funny stories about their relationship box made it easy for her to interrupt the stammering Chuck (Shut up already, nerd!) and commandingly ask him to kiss her. She hadn't completely gotten her memories together yet, but what she possessed was quite enough to never let go of her Chuck. She couldn't live without him after all, damn it!

After this revelation, they hungrily licked each other for a few moments, then she hastily pulled him forward to the car. Chuck had to drive, so her hands trembled. Breathing heavily and sobbing quietly with excitement, her fingers traveled to the car radio, clicking wildly to somehow keep herself busy. Abruptly, George Benson's classic "Kisses in the Moonlight" blasted at them, making them both laugh maniacally. "My Chuck!" she just whimpered, nearly jumping him in the steering wheel, smooching him wildly like a teenager. Chuck had it better: he could keep his hands steady on the wheel and kept calling out to her something that she couldn't for the life of her remember in her blackout. Eventually they reached their hotel room, hearts pounding, blood boiling and lips chafed.

It was the best sex of her life and she kept whipping him forward to finish her off rudely. She needed this treatment and cuddle sex was out of place. He should drive all the shit out of her brain, nail her until the bed collapsed! It wasn't until three days later that they left the room, drunk with happiness, their heads full of future plans and promises of fidelity. Chuck also helped her with the difficult mission of asking Ellie and the others for forgiveness. In the process, he stood behind her and wrapped his arms around her, supportive, teasing and loving as he always was when he saw barricades that needed to be cleared away. After that, she had nothing but upward mobility, both privately and professionally.

Sarah shielded her eyes. Just a stone's throw away lay John Casey, her fellow in good times and bad. Sarah's companions were going to pay him a quick visit and then join her.

She shook her head silently at Casey's passing. A ricochet during a firefight hit the grim swashbuckler so badly that he died a secondary death. He hadn't felt a thing, the coroners attested. He died the way he had always wanted to - honorably for his country, not miserably in a feather bed. "Only wimps die in feather beds, Vikings in Valhalla," he said once, cursorily, as bullets whistled around his ears, and Sarah smiled at the notion. Typical Casey. They would surely welcome him there with kettledrums and trumpets. Painting by numbers or bingo at the retirement home would have been the apocalypse for him. She had also noticed that Casey's willingness to take risks had increased over the years, as if he was aware of it. It amused her that even in the dead man's yard, Casey was surrounded by his lovable "idiots" like Chuck, Jeff and Morgan. She could literally hear his grunts at this strange constellation. He had never married his Gertrude. He hated dependencies; the loose bond was quite enough for him.

Actually, she pondered, everything had turned out well. But she couldn't quite come to terms with the fact that she was the last of the Carmichael team to remain. Was it because women were tougher than men? Was she doomed to pay for her evilness toward Chuck at the time? Of course, Quinn had manipulated her into killing Chuck as a vicarious agent; but didn't her hesitant and hardened attitude drive Chuck to Lou and Jill in the first place? Her contemptuous playing with Chuck's emotions upset even hard-nosed Casey at the time. Bitterly ironic, he had snapped at Sarah in the basement:

"Somehow I feel sorry for him...the complete idiot who still loves you! Every torturer treats his victims more humanly than you do this boy! Put him out of his misery. I think he deserves it!"

Oh, that had hit home and she felt caught. Yes, he was right; ugly and mean, she was doing everything she could to talk Chuck out of the agent fluff and alienate him from the distaste the job brought. Oh, what she had hurt him, beaten him, and nastily snapped at him, "You don't belong anymore, it's over!" What kind of person was this to freely forgive all that?

Well, she could leave the world at any time, for she still had enough of the poison left. But she didn't feel like it yet, which was perhaps due to mad crazy friends who shared a flat with her in the house. She turned her gaze to the two, who slowly approached, cackling and giggling.

"Do you have to cackle so silly loud? If you haven't noticed, this is a graveyard here, a so-called quiet place!"

"So what? People are all dead here..." the willowy Carina said dryly. "So who cares, Sarah?" They laughed irreverently.

"Don't you hear Chuck and Morgan laughing?" Zondra put both palms behind her ears.

"Cheeky as ever!" scolded Sarah twitchily. "You bitches!"

The trio screech happily and Sarah hooked up with the two friends.

"How's Casey?" she asked habitually.

"At least that was a man! Maybe I should have grabbed him," Carina hissed. "But his underpants were hideous! That didn't work at all."

"And those disgusting cigars he was always puffing," grumbled Zondra.

"Purely on purpose to scare women away..." , Sarah was sure, and laughed mirthfully. Carina wrinkled her nose, smoothed out the wrinkles on her face, and pointed to Chuck's grave.

"Chuck's manuscript, Sarah. We've talked about it before. There are so many movie studios here. I know some bigwigs at Disney and Warner. Why don't we go and pitch it to them? Maybe they'll be interested?"

"Let's see. Why not?" Sarah was not averse and exchanged a questioning glance with the two. "Maybe they'll like it!"

Zondra had been through a divorce, Karina never had any luck with men because she found them all kind of shallow and stupid. At Chuck's funeral service, Sarah spontaneously offered them her house as a new domicile so they wouldn't have to live alone, which the two still wiry "Cats" enthusiastically accepted. Together they supported each other in everyday life and traveled a lot around the world, just like Ellie and Devon, who were currently on a European tour and certainly had a lot to talk about at their next dinner party. They were just about halfway there when suddenly a greasy guy emerged from the bushes waving a knife around.

"Give me the money or I'll stab you! Come on, open your pockets!"

The three women's eyes flickered wildly and lit up.

"Are we helpless old frumps?" Carina grinned meanly. "Today is our lucky day, it seems to me."

"Girls, but for a moment, please. Coffee's waiting!" Sarah reached into her purse, rummaging for her cell phone.

"Finally! I've almost lost it!" Zondras tightened her fingers in a claw-like motion.

Seconds later, they swept the pesky highwayman back into the bushes after a few hard, well-aimed swats. Sarah flipped open her smartphone and positioned the screen out at the unconscious man, giggling. "Please quite kindly!" Click.

The defensible three informed security at the exit and trundled, swaying, to their cars.

It had been a beautiful day. He would have liked Chuck.

Carmichael Park

In her cozy bedroom - she had left everything as it was since Chuck's death - she sat upright next to Carina, who now took Chuck's place. In a separate sleeping area at the foot of the double bed slept Zondra. At night she always had the pleasant feeling that Chuck was there and would snuggle up to her, but it was Carina who probably had the same need for closeness. Every now and then Zondra would join them and that was not only very comforting, but it was also quite fun.

She took out the mason's documents and, after a moment's thought, smilingly changed the original planned inscription under "My Chuck":

Sarah

Just a spy

to

Yours

Sarah

Carina looked over her reading glasses at Zondra.

"Did you lock the front door, Zondra?"

"No, you know I didn't!"

"Good girl! Maybe we'll get lucky today!" The three of them laughed rattlingly.

"Let's see who gets the burglar first!", giggled Zondra.

"We live way too safe here," Carina said regretfully. "Nothing happens here at all! We leave everything open and no one comes to visit us. That's crazy! Three old women alone in the house with no men, it screams of a simple robbery, doesn't it?"

Sarah puffed out her cheeks, rolled her eyes, and put the folder away, grinning.

She turned off the bedside lamp and felt under her pillows for the loaded gun as did her two Cats.

Lurking the three lay there. And they also had one thing in common: They dreamt wistfully of days gone by that would never return...