A/N The next part of this story begins. The Ring will become more prominent, Verbanski less so, as various schemes come into play.

"Where have you been?"

"Please tell me you're allowed to flash now."

"You'll make it up to me."

"Here's to moving forward."

Morgan Grimes slipped out of his bedroom like a cat. A large, clumsy cat. He listened for Chuck and/or Sarah to investigate, but all he heard was the usual billing and cooing. No help there. He continued toward his planned objective.

John Casey opened his door at the sound of a knock that was at once both firm and hesitant. How it managed to be both confused him, until he saw Morgan Grimes waiting both firmly and a bit hesitantly on the other side. "What do you want, Grimes?" Had to be about Alex, nothing else affected him that way. "Get in here before you embarrass me."

"Thanks," said Morgan, but once inside he just stood there dithering.

Casey walked past him into the living room, so could turn off his internal monitoring. Something told him this would be a scene best purged from memory. "Well, out with it, moron."

"I will. It's just...so awkward."

"What have you done now?" asked Casey. "You didn't accidentally or on purpose manage to break my little girl's heart with an ill-chosen text message, did you?"

"Of course not," said Morgan defiantly, not hesitant at all. "We mostly communicate by emojis anyway, see?" He held up his phone, displaying what seemed to Casey an endless string of hearts and flowers and little smiling circles.

Casey scowled at it and him. "That's awkward, all right."

"No, it isn't," said Morgan. He pointed to one of the arcane symbols. "See, this is me saying-"

"What do you want?" growled Casey. "Coming from you, 'awkward' means more than it usually does."

"Some days are worse than others, even for me," said Morgan. "Like today for example. The day we had that riot, Big Mike gave me a ring that he planned to propose to my mother with. Talk about awkward. Fortunately I didn't lose it during the riot, but that just meant I still had it when Mike asked me for it today. He's probably trying to get down on one knee right now."

"Ugh," said Casey, moved by the visual.

"I know, right," said Morgan, buoyed by the display of camaraderie, however small.

Very, very small. "So why come to me?"

Morgan gulped. "Well, I don't know if you know, but Alex shipped out yesterday for training for her new job, so I was there with her at the station waiting for the pickup. There must have been a lot of pollen around, or something, 'cause we were both sniffing. I reached into my pocket to give her my handkerchief, and I heard Mike's ring fall on the ground. I bent down to pick it up, and, well..."

Casey caught that visual too, inspired by a memory of himself, the night he 'shipped out'. And where was Alex 'shipping out' to? "You didn't..."

"Well, that's where the awkward part comes in," said Morgan, backing away. "We've spoken since then, but we haven't said a word about what happened. She's acting like nothing happened."

"According to you, nothing did."

"It didn't, but...even though I wasn't proposing, I'd sorta like to know if she thought it was good thing or a horrible thing."

"What about you?" asked Casey, pretty sure he knew his daughter's mind on the subject, but he kept his peace. When Grimes had the stones to ask for himself, then he would deserve to know. "Would you have been happy if she said yes, or would you be as terrified as you are right now?"

"Uh, pretty terrified, I think," said Morgan honestly, sure that Casey could smell anything else. "I didn't think we were there yet..."

"You're not," said Casey. "You're better than Bartowski, but who wouldn't be. The only thing worse than those two not talking about their ladyfeelings were all the precious looks and make-up scenes after they'd managed to screw it up again."

"They used to be such crap communicators," said Morgan, shaking his head sadly. "They got better this last year, but even so, I'm glad Ellie knocked some sense into them when she did, or he'd still be overthinking it, trying to bounce his ideas off me. Painful."

Casey's face fell into a snarl, not a very long fall. "What's painful is you coming to me for romantic advice about a daughter I'm barely allowed to know." Casey grabbed Morgan by the shoulder and steered him toward the door. "You didn't propose, she didn't say yes. Regardless of whether either of you do or don't want you to actually ask, you at least know how I feel on the matter." He shoved Morgan into the courtyard and closed the door halfway. "Ecstatic." Slam.

Across the courtyard...

"You don't think he's gonna come over here, do you?" asked Ellie, keeping her voice low, as if Morgan could hear her.

"He'd better not," said Devon. "Between your work at the hospital and now what you're doing for the government, I don't get to see you often enough myself." When Morgan was gone, he came away from the window and sat down next to her. "And how is my girl?"

"Fine, Devon," said Ellie. "A little frazzled by the extra work..."

"Uh, El," said Devon, "Don't take this the wrong way but I was asking about this girl." He put his large hand over Ellie's baby-bump.

"She's a few cells larger than she was the last time you asked that question, honey," said Ellie, moving his hand. "Don't take this the wrong way, but I'm getting a little babied out, here. She's all we talk about."

"Not all," said Devon. "I talk about the new minivan a lot."

"Believe me, honey, I know. Devon, to you this is the start of an amazing adventure, and it is, but to me it's a twenty-four hour a day job that I can't get away from, even in my sleep, of which I'm getting far too little. Can we please take a vacation from the baby for a little while, be just us again?"

"El, you do know-?"

"Yes, Devon, the baby will be coming along with us, wherever we go," said Ellie tiredly. She knew where her brain cells were going but what was happening to his? "It's just a figure of speech."

At the Buy More...

"Hey bud, what'cha got there?" asked Chuck, as Morgan hurried by with something tucked under his arm. He followed Morgan into his office, before the ass-man could stuff whatever it was-and Chuck had a pretty good idea what it was, since they were doing an author-promotion event that very day-into his desk drawer. "101 Questions Before I Do. Anything we should know?"

"No," said Morgan. "And even less that Casey should know."

"Hence the desk drawer," said Chuck.

"He'll probably find it here too, but at least here I can blame it on you."

"Why would I need a book about I Do?" asked Chuck. "I did already."

"If you think it ends there, you need this book more than I do," said Morgan, as his phone rang. He picked it up. "Buy More Burbank. Speaking. You want my what? My code? Identify yourself." He listened, and said, "Affirmative." He gave Chuck an apologetic look and turned away, cupping a hand over his mouth as he spoke into his phone. "Yes, I'll be right here. Understood." He hung up. "I don't understand."

"Don't understand what?"

He looked at his phone funny, like it had anything to do with what was going on. "Bravo Company's coming to take me into protective custody. They said there's a termination order out on me."

On a secure connection...

"Report," said A.

"Contact has been made," said C. "Instructions have been given. Everything's in the hands of our agent, now."

"Nothing can be traced back to us?"

"Nothing," said C confidently. "Our agent has his own interests in this area. We just had to, eh, smooth his path, shall we say?"

"I distrust personal motivations," said B. "It's unprofessional. If they fail in their personal goals, what will that failure mean to our own?"

"Nothing. We have multiple paths to success, live or die," said C. "And someone will die. That's the best part."

Casey stood to one side and saluted as the squad filed out the door in perfect order. They got into a truck and the leader answered his salute as they drove off. He went inside to see what mess they made this time.

None at all, and he grunted in surprise. Some guy selling a book, and a lot of shoppers on line. The green shirts looking pretty wistful, but they hadn't restocked the video games yet so there was nothing for them to do this time around.

Then he noticed the posters. Wedding rings. Wedding advice. Probably Big Mike's idea. He headed off to Grimes' closet to make sure of that.

He slammed the door open, but instead of Grimes' girlish scream he one of Bartowski's. Could've gone longer without hearing any more of those. He looked at the book the moron was reading. "Don't tell me you bought one of those. You're already on a downhill slope."

Chuck thought fast. The truth absolutely would not do, or Morgan would simply walk out of one termination order into another. "If that's what you think you need this book more than I do." He closed the book and put it away in the drawer. "Do me a favor. if Sarah should somehow happen to discover this, tell her it's Morgan's, okay?"

Casey snorted. Like he had any 'I Dos' in his future. "Speaking of whom, where is the little troll?"

Chuck hopped down off Morgan's desk. "Left with Bravo Company."

"Really? I didn't see him."

"Protection detail. They put him in a uniform."

Casey nodded. "Camouflage, good idea. Assuming Grimes could make it from here to the door without giving it away. What were they protecting him from?"

"He said it was a termination order, but he didn't know whose," said Chuck. "I have no idea who'd be after him now."

"Me neither," said Casey. "Even I don't want him dead, book or no book. Let's leave him with Gertrude while we get a handle on the order."

Chuck and Casey stood side-by-side in Castle, while Sarah joined the meeting remotely from her position at the apartment, watching over Ellie until a new cover could be generated for her. This week they were thinking fitness instructor.

"No such order has been issued by us, team," said General Beckman. "We'll contact Miss Verbanski for whatever details she may have, and look into it."

Chuck smelled a rat. "Is there anything I can do, General?"

"Unfortunately, Agent Bartowski, we have need of your participation elsewhere. We have learned that this man-" a picture of a man in fatigues popped up on the screen "Is on his way to Los Angeles."

Chuck had no idea who the man was, although the uniform was familiar, and he wasn't about to flash on the man if he could help it. "Turrini," snarled Casey, which saved him a step.

"And he is?"

"The Chief aide to this man," said Beckman, putting another image on the screen.

Chuck recognized him far too easily. "Goya again?"

"Goya still," muttered Casey.

"We need you to stake out the embassy and find out what Turrini is doing here. Costa Gravas is moving forward into a democratic world, we need to make sure nothing happens to reverse that. Dismissed."

"Hey Sarah?" asked Chuck, as they waited in the van. Casey had gone from the Buy More straight home to take over Sarah's duties, far from any possibility of random encounters with Costa Gravans.

"Yes, Chuck?" Sarah asked with some amusement. Her fiance's voice sounded like he was up to something.

"You know that 'I Do' book I got?"

"Mm-hmm." 'Wasted money on' was more like it. If there was one person in the world she didn't need to have those conversations with, it was him.

"Could you not tell Morgan we have one? He wants to think he's helping."

Sarah sighed. "I wish you'd said something earlier. I already told Ellie it was his."

Chuck sighed. "I need a flowchart."

"Hey, lovebirds," snapped Casey's voice from a speaker, "Whatever you're talking about, stop. I'm pretty sure I don't want to hear it."

"If you couldn't hear it how did you know we were talking?"

"You've heard of video, right, numb-nuts?" They could practically hear him shake his head in disgust. "Anyway, it looks like Turrini isn't going to the embassy. Three guesses where he is going."

Devon left off giving his wife a foot rub at the sound of a firm knock on the front door. "Who could that be at this time of night?"

"Check the screen like Sarah told you," said Ellie, moving closer to the safe room. She hit her speed-dial. "Casey?"

"I see 'em," said their protector, studying them as he targeted the weapons. "I see no guns, no attack stance." No hits on the heat and motion detectors. "They look more like an honor guard. Devon, no need to antagonize them. Answer the door, nice and easy. I got you covered."

From across the courtyard he saw the door open, Devon managing to look both surprised and scared. Guy couldn't lie his way out of a paper bag, so he probably was, not that Casey could blame him. "Hello?"

"Buenos noches, senor Doctor Woodcombe," said Turrini. He and his men snapped off respectful salutes. "Costa Gravas calls once more."

A/N2 So we ended up in more or less the same place, having gone by a totally different route to get here. Please let me know what you think of it.