I don't own Chuck
"We've lowered the morphine," he heard Ellie say, not feeling the tug like he had the past few times he woke up. "He should be coming out of it soon."
"And then the real work begins," he heard Sarah say.
"Nah, I'm pretty sure you started the real work a few weeks ago," he heard Ellie reply. He heard a giggle beside him and tried to turn her head toward him. "Oh look, Sleeping Beauty is trying to wake now. I do need to check his vitals."
"I guess brother trumps being a Neurologist?"
"Absolutely," Ellie said, and then he saw her, and then a bright light. Was it over? Was he supposed to go toward teh light? Suddenly everything went dark, and then he saw Ellie again but this time in the other eye. Again there was a bright light. "Good," she murmured.
"'Arah?" he managed to get out. He felt his right hand being squeezed.
"I'm here, Chuck, I'm here," he heard her say. He tried to open his eyes, and he saw her. Again, she was fuzzy, looked like she had lost a fight, but he realized how beautiful she was, regardless of the state.
"You okay?" he managed to get out. He saw her smile widen.
"I will be now," she replied. Chuck didn't know what that meant but he shut his eyes again, feeling very tired.
}o{
A few hours later, he opened his eyes, the majority of the painkillers making him sleep flushed from his system. He looked down at his stomach and he remembered what happened. Bryce had shot him. In the gut.
"Sarah!" he said, remembering how she had been hurt. She jumped in the chair beside him and that's when he saw it was a wheelchair she had been sitting in. "Your leg."
"I'm okay, Chuck," she told him. He gave her the flatest look he could manage, and she chuckled. "Okay, no permanent damage." He nodded. "What do you remember?"
"Not a lot," he admitted.
"Bryce showed up," Sarah reminded him. Chuck nodded. "He…he seemed to know fighting moves and styles perfectly."
"He did," Chuck replied. "He kicked our asses."
"Broke my leg, sent me flying," Sarah recounted. She was silent for a moment. "And then he was going to shoot me, and you punched him," Sarah continued. "And then he shot you."
"He laughed at me," Chuck said, remembering everything. "Jokes on him though, he played his cards. He now has…something-"
"They're calling it the Intersect," Sarah told him. "Apparently it is much more advanced than they thought. It has fighting styles and all sorts of physical abilities implanted into it."
"He's lazy," Chuck told her. "He will use that, like a crutch."
"So what do we do?"
"We figure out how to take him out as a team," Chuck told her. "We learn how to fight as one."
"That's gonna mean a lot of time together, Chuck."
"You should probably run, get away from me," Chuck told her. He hurried on before she could disagree. "But I hope you don't."
}o{
Days later found the whole team in his new hospital room now that he was out of the ICU. "So it appears that Bryce had the new, upgraded Intersect all along," Casey began. "He was just going around, destroying the parts so no one could create another."
"I mean, we could," Chuck said, making Casey snort. "It slows us down, but we could."
"They also think it's driving him crazy," Casey continued. He paused a second, looked at Chuck, and continued. "Crazy enough to kill his own father."
"That may not be the Intersect," Chuck said softly. Everyone turned to him. "He said something to me long ago, about adults who let kids be mistreated…beaten." He was silent a second. He looked up at everyone. "I wonder how far Alexi would have gone with his son?"
Casey grunted and looked away, a look of disgust on his face. "Heal up, Chuckles," Catrina cut in. "You're our best hope of stopping him. For now, the four of us are going to try to put out all the fires he's causing."
"Hey, we mean it, you two get better," Zondra said, pointing from one to the other. The team filed out, Cole not saying a word, and Chuck wondered how much of an outsider he felt like.
"Don't do it," Sarah said softly.
"What, ask Cole how he's doing?" Chuck asked.
"No, that's fine, it's the other thing you're doing," Sarah told him. "And before you even try to tell me you're not sitting here feeling sorry for Bryce and his circumstances, I know you." Chuck shut his mouth before he said exactly what she told him not to say.
She sighed and shook her head. "Chuck, what happened to him was terrible, but it doesn't excuse what he did to you."
"It doesn't," Chuck agreed. "But it is sad." Sarah shook her head. "So, there's been a lot going on the past few days, and I need to ask something." He was rubbing his hands on the sheets over his legs. They were sweating. "I thought I heard you say something a few days ago and-"
"I love you," she said, smiling at his spiraling, and feeling sorry for the guy. She shrugged. "I don't need you to say it back, I don't need you to feel anything for me. And before you say it's from you saving me or something stupid like that, I was feeling it long before that happened."
"I see," Chuck said. Sarah reached over, took his hand and squeezed it. "Before I met you, I wondered if I could ever feel…ever love again. Bryce broke something in me…at least I thought he did." He blew out a rough breath and looked over at her. "I don't know what I'm feeling, but it's something."
"Well, that's something," she told him, grinning. "I told you that I don't need you to say it to me. I just need you to know that you are loved, Chuck Bartowski. Now, get some sleep."
"You know you do have your own room," Chuck began. She gave him a flat look. "You're totally moving into my room when we get to the apartment, aren't you."
She gave him a look that clearly said, "Don't be stupid, of course I am."
"I told you, I would never do anything like him," Sarah began.
"And you haven't," Chuck told her, squeezing her hand. "You've been saving me." Sarah looked away, a smile on her face, a tear rolling down her cheek. He leaned over the best he could, and placed a soft kiss on the side of her head. "Thank you."
She didn't say anything as he laid back and closed his eyes, but he swore the warmth and safety he felt from her hand wrapped around his, seemed to grow.