A/N: There's been a lot of kind words the past several chapters. First we LOVE this fic. Second we have it plotted for a long time. We figure we're 20% done with it for those who worry we'll stop. Third for everyone of you who have said this entire setup is SC's jam…..you're 10000% right. Sit back, get a cocktail and hang on to your butts.

Disclaimer: We don't own Chuck, and we don't own the characters. We aren't making any money.


She spotted the door to the quarterdeck straight ahead at the end of the hallway, and there was another hallway that jutted off to the left a few paces in front of them.

"When I tell you to go, run to the door that leads to the quarterdeck. You see it?" she breathed without turning her head to look at him.

"Yeah," he muttered out of the side of his mouth.

"Good. Don't stop no matter what you hear. Just run as fast as you can. And when you get out there, turn right, keep running towards the stern of the boat—that's the back—and—"

"I know what the stern is, Sarah. I watched Master and Commander five times in theaters." She gave him a look and he shrugged. "Russell Crowe is never bad in anything."

"Chuck."

"Sorry. Right. Run to the stern."

"There should be stairs that take you to the promenade deck, and from there you can get inside to the hallway outside of our cabin. Do not stop until you get inside, lock the door, and wait for me there. You got it? No matter how long I take to get there."

"I got it. Yeah. What are you gonna do, though?"

"I'm gonna fuck up a Ring agent, Chuck, what do you think?"

Something swept over his face then and he let out a rough breath. "Oh. Wow. I… Never mind."

Sarah slipped her arm around his waist and giggled flirtatiously, seamlessly pulling him down the hallway to the left, and then she swung him around and pinned him against the wall, pressing herself to the corner, her knife in hand. She pressed a finger to Chuck's lips, but she knew she didn't have to. He got the picture loud and clear. And he reached up to pull her finger from his mouth, instead pulling her hand down to his chest. She spread her fingers there and felt his heart hammering wildly beneath her touch. She imagined he was terrified. But he stood deathly still anyway, just waiting...waiting…

The Ring agent came around the corner fast enough that it nearly caught Sarah off guard though. She ducked low to try to jam her knife into his ribcage, but he side-stepped it just in time. Sarah brought her other fist around to crack it into his temple and sent him staggering against the opposite wall. "Go!" she barked at Chuck.

And he took off down the hall towards the quarterdeck, disappearing from her view. But as soon as he was gone, she felt a pain at the back of her knee and she went down hard, watching as the Slenderman bound to his feet and dashed after Chuck. She made a lunging dive to try to catch him by his boot but he escaped her grip.

"Fuck!" she snapped, rushing up to her feet and running after him. The kick he'd given her knee to take her down hurt like a bitch and the heels weren't helping, but she ran as fast as she could anyway, watching as the Ring agent put distance between them.

He burst out onto the quarterdeck, looked left, then right… Shit, he'd seen Chuck. He couldn't be far behind him either. Sarah sped up, knife still in her hand. She nearly skidded into the railing and spun over it, which would mean certain death in the deep blue sea. She caught herself though and made a mad dash down the quarterdeck towards the stern, the way she'd instructed Chuck to run.

But as she got to the stairs, she had a clear view of the curved deck down at the stern. Chuck was running towards the railing. She was going to curse him for not listening to her at first as she scrambled down the narrow staircase towards the deck below, but then it hit her why he didn't go to the room. It was the same reason why she'd guided him up the stairs to the floor above rather than going straight to the room.

They didn't want the Ring to be privy to their room number. They'd be in serious trouble and there was nowhere else for them to go on this cruise ship.

Part of her wanted to throw the knife at the Ring agent's back as he ran towards Chuck… She was too far away, as good as she was at throwing her knives. The chance it might sail past the Slenderman and hit Chuck was too high. And she wasn't taking that kind of risk. Not for anything.

"Why are you chasing me?" Chuck demanded in a shrill voice. But the Ring agent didn't respond, instead wrapping his fist in the lapel of the younger man's tuxedo and swinging him against the railing. Sarah's heart leapt to her throat and she nearly staggered to a stop, but Chuck didn't go over the railing like she'd thought he might.

The bespectacled criminal was snarling something she couldn't hear in Chuck's face as she slowed down and crept closer to them, slipping her knife into a better position.

"What are you talking about? What-What key?" Chuck asked desperately. She knew he saw her but he wasn't giving the other agent any clue, keeping his terrified gaze on the man's face instead. "No, I don't know about any keys! What the fuck, dude?!"

Sarah got close enough to see the Ring agent go into his pocket then, and out came the gun. No!

She acted on impulse, lunging. She stuck the Slenderman in his arm, but he still managed to swing the gun around and get a shot off. The silencer at the end of it made a fweep sound and she felt a slice of pain on her thigh, but she didn't let it stop her. One hand slapped over his face, the other crashing down over the barrel of the gun.

He cried out and dropped it, which Chuck promptly kicked off of the end of the ship and out of sight, most likely disappearing into the watery depths below.

And she used the grip she had on his face to shove him down onto the deck, following with a swift kick to his stomach. He hunched over in a pained cough as she reached down to take her knife out from where she'd stuck it in his bicep, making him cry out again. But as she swung her fist down to finish the job, aiming for his temple, his hand came up and blocked it away, before he snagged a handful of heavy rope and threw it into her face.

She gasped in surprise and fell over onto her back, one of her heels catching on one of the wooden floorboards beneath her feet. It was stuck and he was closing in on her. With clammy fingers, she tried to unbuckle the heel so that she could just step out of it, but her fingers kept slipping against the leather.

But then Chuck dove right over her head, catching the Slenderman in the chest, a full-blown football tackle. The two men crashed onto the deck and began to wrestle. The Slenderman pinned Chuck, but her partner got his leg lodged between them somehow and used his foot to shove the other man off of him, before staggering to his feet.

"C'mon, asshole! Let's go! C'mon!" he taunted, beckoning the other man in the same way Bruce Lee had done to his opponents in those movies he and Morgan had made her watch all those months ago while eating sizzling shrimp.

It was ridiculous.

But it worked.

The other man growled and sprinted at him. And as he took off, his feet surging into the air, arms out to grab at Chuck, the NSA agent-in-training hit the deck, dropping so quick the Ring agent's knees slammed into the railing, sending him swinging over. He made a last-ditch effort to grab the railing on his way down, but the blood from his knife wound had dripped down over his hand, and his fingers slipped.

He let out a loud scream. Chuck hurried to his feet and peered over the railing, his eyes wide. And then he winced and narrowed his eyes, turning away and slumping to sit on the deck, almost like a rag doll. She hadn't heard the splash, but the sound of the ocean smacking into the boat and the thrum of the engine was loud enough, that she figured she wouldn't have heard anyway.

All she knew was that the Ring agent's scream was cut off.

"He didn't come back up," Chuck muttered. "D'you think it's the height? The height of the fall? Or…?" He shivered as she watched him closely. And then he frowned and shook himself, crawling over to her side in a mad scramble. "You okay?"

His hands gently wrapped around her ankle and she froze, watching his face closely as he eased his fingers down to carefully wiggle her heel back and forth until it popped out of the crack.

"There. You're free."

His eyes swept up to meet hers, their faces mere inches apart, and she held his gaze for way, way too long, before she broke it and quickly straightened to her full height. But she winced then, hissing at the sudden resurgence of pain. Her leg...his bullet had caught her. She pushed at her gown and saw a rip along her thigh, dotted with blood, but it felt like a graze more than anything.

Chuck was there immediately. "C'mon. Let's get back to the room. Quick." Then he paused, looking down at her hand that was still holding the knife shimmering with the Ring agent's blood. "Maybe hide the bloody knife."

"Oh. Good idea." She grabbed at the gown and hiked it up, slipping it into the holster there. It'd be less noticeable and she really didn't want to soil the nice white bra she was wearing under this gown where she'd hidden the knife when it was clean.

"Can you walk?"

"Yes. Let's just go. Hold on, lemme just—" She grabbed his arm with both hands tightly and winced as they walked to the door that led into the hallway. God, it hurt. It really, really stung bad, and she could feel the hot trail of blood dripping slowly down her leg. One single drop, traversing down her thigh… Damn it.

She grit her teeth and hissed.

"Almost there. I can carry you if you—Nope. That look was a no. Got it. We'll walk." He cleared his throat and kept walking her towards their room, but she noticed he was actively taking more of her weight anyway in spite of relenting on the carrying her option.

They got back to their room what felt like hours later, when really it was maybe about thirty seconds, and he was quick and efficient in unlocking the door and pushing it open for her to hobble inside, before he rushed after her and shut it behind him, turning the lock securely.

She gaped a little as Chuck ordered her to the bathroom, even as he strode through the suite to the bedroom, swept his tuxedo jacket off, and tossed it onto the bed. She did as she was told, hoisting herself up onto the counter with a pained hiss, and carefully rolling the material of the mint green gown she'd thought was so pretty up her leg and to her waist.

Stretching her leg out, she winced. The bullet had definitely grazed her thigh, and there was an angry line of blood, about four inches or so, with one single trail of blood dripping down, almost having reached her knee.

Chuck was there, unbuttoning his cuffs and rolling his sleeves up to his elbows, and then he dug under the counter for the pale green washcloth, turning the water on to warm, testing it a few times, and wetting the cloth.

"This is going to hurt," he warned, but she sent him a flat look. "I-I know. You've had worse than this." He oh so gently set the cloth to her knee and swiped it slowly up her leg to clean the blood away, and then he dabbed even more gently over the wound.

She hissed in through her teeth and let her breath out through pursed lips, shutting her eyes for a moment. "It's not that deep, I don't think. At least there's that."

Chuck went digging under the counter again, rummaging through the cupboard, and he came out with a small first aid kit. He plopped it on the counter next to her and opened it. "If they charge the room for using these bandages, I'll go ballistic, I swear."

She couldn't help but laugh, and when his face lit up at the reaction he'd obviously been angling for, she felt something tighten in her chest. Again. She knew what it was but she willed herself to ignore it as best she could.

He was adept at applying the bandage once he'd thoroughly cleaned the wound and held the cloth there until the bleeding stopped, and she found herself wondering if it was just a second nature thing, or if being the brother of a surgeon had something to do with it. She didn't ask; she just watched him quietly.

"There," he said finally, both of his hands closing over her thigh where the bandage was, pressing down gently on the tape. "It feel okay?"

She swallowed, her throat dry. "Yes. Thank you."

He pulled his hands away and then he looked down at them with a furrowed brow, just holding them out in front of him, almost as if he didn't know what to do with them suddenly. It was strange. It was one of the most Chuck Bartowskiesque things she'd ever seen him do.

She tossed the material of the dress back down over her legs and slid down off of the counter again. Then she pulled at the gown. "Shit. I hope this wasn't actually from the nineteen-forties. To last sixty years and still be this beautiful, only for some CIA spy to wear it on a mission and wreck it by getting herself shot."

"I can patch up your leg, but unfortunately, I'm not much of a seamstress," he said, wrinkling his nose.

Sarah giggled. "I'm not, either. I'll at least let it soak a bit."

Without thinking about it, she reached back to unclasp the back of the gown and let the silky material fall down around her ankles. As she stepped out of it and bent to retrieve it from the floor, she heard Chuck make a "Hwuh—ahhh…" sound. She looked up to see he'd turned away from her, his hands over his eyes.

She blushed. "Oh. Shit, sorry. I wasn't think—"

"Oh, no. No, no. S'okay. I'm just gonna step into the—ow, the other room. Kay bye." He'd smacked his shoulder into the doorframe as he rushed out halfway through his sentence. And then he was gone.

She rolled her eyes to the ceiling and mouthed a curse at herself, before she set to cleaning the dress. And when she was finished, she emerged from the bathroom wearing one of the bathrobes she found hanging on the back of the door.

Chuck had dressed down, wearing just his boxers and the white muscle shirt he'd had on under the white crisp button-up the NSA had packed for him. He was sitting at the end of the bed, just staring down at the floor at his bare feet, wiggling his toes a little against the cool wood.

He looked up as she walked in, unpinning her hair and letting it fall down in waves to her shoulders. "I don't think he must've told the killer chemist lady he was going after us. Maybe she didn't even notice he'd left the room. Otherwise she would've been there to help him, right?"

Sarah nodded and sat beside him. "I think so. It's hard to know with this new Ring situation, Chuck. I can't imagine they have some sort of moral code they follow. The way you dove in to help me? Not sure a Ring agent would do that for one of their fellow—"

"Assholes," he interrupted. She gave him a look, incapable of keeping the amused smirk from her face. He cleared his throat. "Sorry. Were you not going to call them that?"

"Well, no. But it fits."

He pushed to his feet, pulling at the mess of moussed up curls that were at least a bit flatter than they usually were. "I'm gonna shower quick and get this out of my hair. It feels like a yak sneezed onto my head."

She made a grossed out sound. "Thanks for that."

He was still chuckling as he grabbed fresh boxers and a T-shirt and ducked into the bathroom.

Sarah pulled herself to the head of the bed and took a deep breath. A chill went through her as she replayed the events of the evening in her mind. One Ring agent was dead, gone without a trace. Whether anyone realized he was gone, put the pieces together, she wasn't sure if they would do anything about it. But she knew there was at least another on this ship. And she had to assume there were even more than that. Perhaps the man the Ring chemist had been dancing with.

She and Chuck were horribly outnumbered. But if they could get down to the hold without being caught and at least take a look at what was down there, maybe they could pick their way through the clues—if Shaw even gave them anything else, that was—and get off of this ship with the key, with Ring agents being none the wiser.

Everything caught up with her a few minutes later and she drifted off to sleep, completely lost to the world, unaware of the man who'd walked out of the bathroom and found her splayed over the pillows in a deep slumber, and unaware of the smile that stretched across his face.

}o{

He woke up at the gentle prodding to his shoulder. And then it was a little less gentle. "Chuck," came the whisper. "Hey. C'mon, wake up. We've got work to do."

He couldn't help the annoyed grunt followed by a quiet whining sound. As he blinked his eyes open, he saw that the sun wasn't even out. "I'stil dark," he mumbled, his voice muffled by his pillow.

"That's kind of the point," she said in a flat voice. She apparently decided a whisper wasn't necessary. "We're gonna be sneaking around the ship. It's a lot easier to do when most people onboard are asleep."

"Not the gamblers," he said through a moaning yawn. He half rolled to face her as she hovered over him, still wrapped up in the robe he'd tucked the covers over when he'd found her zonked out after his shower. "Gamblers never sleep. And I saw the tables."

"Great, so we know not to go near the lounge. C'mon. Up." She squeezed his shoulder and rolled out from under the covers and off of the bed, crossing the dark room to turn on a light.

He groaned and protected his eyes by throwing his arms up to block his face. "You're worse than Ellie on a school morning."

Chuck thought he heard a quiet giggle. When he finally crawled out of bed gingerly, he grappled at his suitcase for a black pair of pants and a black cotton sweater that he tugged down over the white T-shirt he'd slept in.

They left the room, both dressed in dark but hopefully inconspicuous clothing, Sarah's blond hair pulled up beneath a black wool beret. She'd caught him grinning at it and glared, which had killed the grin immediately.

It wasn't yet five in the morning, but there were still a few staff members cleaning, making deliveries, picking up the trays from outside of the doors of guests who'd ordered room service the night before.

After exploring the belly of the beast, as he thought of it in his own brain to try to keep himself awake and alert, for long enough that the sky was slowly starting to lighten a bit outside, they finally found what Sarah thought was the entrance to the hold. But two crew members dressed in nineteen-forties cruise liner uniform leaned against the doorway, smoking cigarettes.

"Shit," she breathed, putting a hand on his chest and pulling him back around the corner and out of sight.

He snuck a peek back around the corner for just a split second and watched as the two men chuckled together. They didn't look like they were going to budge anytime soon, damn it. He pulled back and shook his head at her. "Are they just on break or do you think they're guarding the entrance?"

"I don't know." She pressed her lips together and then nibbled on the inside of her cheek thoughtfully. "We'll have to just try to come back later. At least we know where it is."

"We think we know where it is," he muttered as they left the hold entrance behind and walked towards the stairs leading up to the staff quarters, then up through the crew quarters, and finally to the lobby and dining area.

"That has to be it. We already looked through most of the rest of the ship. Only other route down leads to the boiler room. I'm not so sure we'll find the key there," she said.

He shrugged with his whole upper body. "Maybe!"

She eyed him closely. "You're not making this any easier."

"But I'm not making it any harder, either," he said, lifting a finger. He winced at the lock that garnered him and held his hands up. "Sorry. The sarcasm, I know. I'm just very tired." He felt a sudden tug in his chest then, an unpleasant one. Because something in her face made him think maybe he wasn't being the best spy at the moment. "I'm gonna power through it, though. I'm gonna be fine. Brain's still super alert and sharp. I have the reflexes of a jungle cat." But just then his foot caught a little on a pipe jutting from the wall to the floor and he staggered, catching himself quickly and popping up to his full height. "Pretend that didn't happen."

Sarah smirked and shook her head, then grabbed his arm to stop him and turned him so that he was pressed against the wall. She stepped in a little closer and fixed him with a serious stare. "Chuck, it's okay that you're tired. And it's okay to talk about how tired you are. You might be a spy now, but you're also a human being."

He felt silly for saying it but he said it anyway. "You never complain about being tired. And for that matter, neither does Casey."

"Yeah, well...that's because I'm always tired," she said with a huff, "and Casey? Really, Chuck? All he does is whine and grunt and make that ugh sound about everything. I mean, he takes a bullet better than I do," she said with a tilt of her head, gesturing to her thigh, "I'll give him that. But all he does is complain."

Chuck pursed his lips and raised his eyebrows. "You...sorta have a point with that."

"I know I do. Come on." She began walking again and he hurried to walk alongside her. He hadn't forgotten what she said about how she was always tired, though. He stuck that away in the back of his mind, a feeling of melancholy trapped in his chest over it. "Look, Chuck. Doing this work...it isn't about being invincible. We aren't superheroes like the people in your comic books. I don't want you going into the spy life thinking that's what you have to be. Nobody expects that from you." She gave him a look. "At least...I don't."

He read between the lines a little. He could see it in her face. The slight pout, the way her brow furrowed. She didn't expect it from him...and she didn't want it. Not that he'd forgotten exactly, but he was reminded again of how sincere she'd sounded and looked when she told him she didn't want the spy life to change him.

"Noted," he said, unable to keep the warmth from his voice.

She smiled a little, though not at him. And she nodded. "Good."

When they got back to their room, the sun was just barely a sliver on the horizon outside of their window, slowly sneaking up out of the water, and Chuck stood with the curtain tied back, staring at the sight. He could hear Sarah rummaging around in her suitcase, for what he didn't know.

"Ya know? I never really get to see the sunrise much, especially not like this."

"Is that your way of thanking me for getting you up so early?"

He heard the teasing lilt in her voice and he smirked with a flat look over his shoulder, seeing the small cheeky grin on her face as she looked up at him from her suitcase. "No," he said resolutely. "It is not. Especially since we didn't even get into the hold after all that sneaking through the dark in the wee hours of the morning."

"Yeah, that's my bad. But at least we have a better idea of the layout of this massive thing."

Chuck had to give her that, shrugging a bit. "So what's on the docket for today? A little shuffleboard? Think the NSA packed me loafers?" She just snorted. "I hope they packed me something casual, at least. I can't go around in full-blown three-piece suits and tuxedos this whole trip."

"How do you feel about sweater vests?"

}o{

Sarah smirked at the man splayed out on the lounge chair next to her. She was in her wide-leg trousers, a blouse, and a wide-brim hat, with little round sunglasses protecting her eyes. She liked how it felt. It was airy, allowing the breeze that wafted through the sundeck grace her legs a bit more than jeans would.

But poor Chuck was in a brown pair of trousers that were nearly as high as hers were, with his blue button-up tucked into them, and a light brown and orange striped sweater vest over it. And a navy blue tie tucked into that. The part was still in his hair, sending his curls in something of the same direction, combed away from the part… but he refused to put the "yak sneeze" in his hair again. It was a just barely tamed mess and it was hard not to like.

But he looked really uncomfortable. She wondered if it was the high pants thing. Maybe he was too warm in the sweater vest. He kept fidgeting in his chair either way.

"You okay? Uncomfortable?" she asked him.

"I've been looking at these people's faces for almost an hour now, Sarah. I'm on the verge of a sunburn, but only from here up," he said, putting his hand to his tie, "and I haven't flashed once. Not once."

She huffed, leaning her elbow on the arm of the chair and propping her chin in her palm. "I can't imagine there aren't more of them," she said, lowering her voice.

"Neither can I." He shook his head, then leaned over the arm of his lounge to get closer to her. "How likely is it that there are agents in the Ring organization who aren't going to be in the Intersect?" he asked. There was flirtation in his face and in his tone, and she knew it was for the cover, even if it made the warmth of the sun seem that much warmer.

She leaned in likewise and smirked with an equal amount of flirtation. "I suppose it's likely. Someone without a criminal record, someone who's kept off of the FBI's radar."

"Why would someone like that ever want to join a criminal organization like the Ring?"

"Hell if I know."

He opened his mouth to respond, but then she saw that look she recognized all too well: the way his face froze in shock for a moment, and then his eyes rolled a little, his jaw going slack, and then he snapped his eyes shut tightly and shook his head. But then it happened again. And when a third flash came over him, she grabbed him by his arm and hurried out of her chair to push him to lie back, leaning over him.

"Ma'am, is he all right? Can I get you anything?" A nearby porter rushed over, his walky-talky in hand. "We have medical staff on hand…"

"I'm fine—I'm okay, I'm good," Chuck rushed out, his eyes springing open. He held up a hand. "Just a little sunstroke, maybe. Honey? Uh...maybe I'd like to lie down in the room for a while?" he said, breathless.

She heard desperation in his voice and she sprung into action. "Thank you, I'll take care of my husband," she said to the porter. People were pausing to glance at them now, and she was careful to look every bit the part of a concerned, doting wife as she put her arms around him and helped him sit up.

"Can I get him some water?" the porter asked.

He was sincere and just doing his job but she wanted to snap at him to go away because him being there was causing a minor scene. She couldn't exactly say no to his offer either, considering Chuck had just blamed his episode on sunstroke, so she nodded and thanked the porter who rushed off.

Sarah took her floppy hat off of her head and fanned Chuck's face with it. "You feeling a little better, sweetie?" she asked as he sat up and swung his legs around.

"Oh, yeah. Much. Much better." He nodded and leaned close to her. "I flashed on three different people. All of them are criminals, worked under drug smugglers, arms dealers, and despots. They've got records in the Intersect that make them sound...kind of, uh, grisly...let's just put it that way."

"Okay, so what you're saying is...we're surrounded."

His eyes widened in confirmation. Shit.

"Could you recognize them if you saw them again?"

"Yeah. Yeah, definitely."

"Well, at least there's that." She looked up as the porter came around with a glass of ice water that was dripping with condensation. "Oh, thank you so much, sir. Here, honey, drink this."

To his credit, Chuck took a short amount of time to gulp the entire glass of water back. "Much better," he said. "Thanks, man."

"Sure. You need help getting him back to your cabin? If you give me your room number, I can have a doctor sent to check up on you."

"No, really. I'm okay. Thanks." Chuck stood to his feet and slung his arm over Sarah's shoulders as she joined him. "I've got my lovely wife here to take care of me. Thanks for your help."

She ushered Chuck away from the lounge chairs and snuck through the nearest door into the hallway, deciding that getting off of the sundeck was the best bet. They could get back to their cabin using the hallways and staircases inside. Since apparently there was a whole Ring party going on out on the decks all of a sudden.

"What are we going to do?" Chuck asked, still leaning against her a bit even though no one was around for the cover. And then she realized he'd just flashed three times in rapid succession. He was most likely still leaning on her because he needed to.

"Get to the cabin where we're safe and let you lie down to rest."

"I don't need to rest. We need to find that key and get off this damn ship." When they got to the stairs that led down to their floor, he pulled her to a stop and glanced down the hallway, before looking down into her face. "Still think I could've pulled this mission off alone? It's a ship full of criminals who work for a secret terrorist organization. This is literally hell. We're on a hell ship. Every time I see one of 'em, I'm gonna flash. I flash this many times in a row, and I'm out of commission for a bit." He tapped his temple. "What the hell is that Shaw guy playing at?" he asked. "We've been on this ship for two days now and we've got nothin' so far. He hasn't sent us any more information, either. If you weren't here, it'd be me, my flashes, no information to go on, and a shit ton of murderous traitors surrounding me."

"Welcome to the spy life, Chuck." She couldn't help it. This was what she'd been trying to tell him from the start of this, when she'd first found out about his decision to join the NSA. This was what she'd been trying to get through his head. "The chances of being sent on a mission in which you've got the odds in your favor are slim to none, Chuck. That's what we're for. That's why they send us."

He frowned and kept walking down the hallway towards their room, having to put a hand out to push off of the wall every few paces since he wasn't leaning on her anymore. She followed after him. "Do you understand, Chuck? Shaw was willing to send you on this mission without me, without Casey, because that's what these agencies do. He isn't an outlier. That's just business as usual."

"So we're expendable to them. Is that the point you're making?"

"No," she said. "You're not expendable, Chuck. That's the point I'm making. Which is why I didn't want you in this business," she hissed, taking his arm. "And it isn't just the Intersect. It's you. And it isn't about whether or not I think you're capable of being a good spy. You've proven you are."

He stopped at their room and unlocked it, pushing the door open and walking in, in one swift and graceful movement. She walked in right on his heels and slammed the door shut behind her, flicking the lock.

"I get it, Sarah. You don't want me to change. The spy life is gonna change me. Being in situations like this will change me. And you don't want that to happen." He turned to face her, standing at the foot of their bed. "But this is me. I'm this guy now, sure, the guy on a mission with his partner surrounded by Ring agents on a giant ship in the middle of the Caribbean sea. I'm a spy. But I'm still the guy that is freaked the hell out by our current predicament and wants the hell off this ship, even though I'm fully prepared to go through with whatever I have to in order to get that key back to Langley. I just tripped on a fuckin' pipe this morning because I'm sleep deprived. This is me, Sarah. Things are going to be different, and I guess it's up to you to decide if it's different enough to…"

He trailed off, looked down at the floor beneath his feet, and then sat down, not meeting her gaze at all, in fact pointedly looking away from it as she just stood near the door. He quickly tugged his shoes off. "I'm going to get some rest."

Sarah just stared at him for a few moments, and then she nodded. "I'm going to see if I can contact Shaw."

As she stepped out of the bedroom, sliding the double doors shut to give him some peace while he rested, she felt an incredible weight pressing down on her. She tried to shake it off as she made her phone call to update Shaw and hopefully get a thread of something from him that might help them out.

Sarah wandered over to the window and peered out over the promenade deck's railing, taking in the sparkling blue Caribbean waters for a moment and pulling the number up on her cellphone. She texted first, requesting a short meeting, and her phone rang not half a minute later.

"Walker, secure."

"What is it, Agent Walker?"

She clenched her jaw. "Chuck has been flashing on Ring agents, Agent Shaw. Left and right. One of them attacked last night after dinner."

"They attacked? So they know you're CIA?" her fellow CIA agent asked. "Shit."

"I don't know that he knew who we were, just that we were suspicious. But he followed us from our table when we finished eating and then he attacked, tried to get Chuck to tell him where the key was."

Shaw let out a breath. "That's good. It means they still don't know where the key is, or who has it."

"Yes, but Agent Shaw, neither do we. And there are only two of us and a lot of them."

There was a long pause. "How many is a lot?"

"There was the one we took care of last night. And then another Chuck flashed on—a chemist. The Intersect had her as ex-MI6, name of Agent Julia Barringer."

"I'll look her up and send you the dossier. Is that it?"

The impatience in his tone made her want to reach through her phone and strangle him. She took a quiet, calming breath and shut her eyes. "No. That isn't it. We have been looking for more. In just the span of about ten or fifteen seconds out on the sundeck, Chuck flashed on three other agents. There's bound to be even more than that. I have a bad feeling we're surrounded by Ring agents on this ship, Agent Shaw."

He was quiet again. "Hm. Not ideal."

She balked. "Not ideal? There are two of us here, Agent. And Chuck's barely been trained for a month."

"Do you not trust your partner's ability to be in the field, Agent Walker?"

She turned away from the window and glared, hoping he could feel it. "That is not the problem at all. You have two agents, one of us with almost no field experience, going against a ship full of who knows how many Ring agents. Those aren't great odds for any team, Agent Shaw."

"Agent Walker, you're supposed to be the best agent the CIA has ever had in its ranks. Graham's Wildcard Enforcer. You were always the agent they called when they needed a job done, isn't that right?" She didn't respond and he continued. "First you coddle Agent Carmichael and hamper his training, then you convince him he can't learn on the job unless you're there right alongside him, and now you think not even you can do the job." She could murder him, she thought. If he was in front of her right at that moment, she would strangle the life out of him. "What chance do any of us have if this is the best team the CIA and NSA have to offer?"

Sarah grit her teeth, her free hand folding itself into a tight fist. "We are the best team the CIA and NSA has to offer. And you know that's the truth. But we aren't superhuman. We aren't invincible."

"I'm not asking for invincibility. We're just asking for you to get the job done. Find a way to get that key without the Ring agents getting there first, Agent Walker. No matter how many of their people the Ring got onto the cruise ship, they're still at the same spot we are. They don't know who brought the key onto the ship, and they don't know where that person is hiding it."

She tried to push her own ego to the side. Because what he said had stung. And she wanted to punch him in the throat for it. But the mission had to come first. "So I take it that means you have nothing else to offer as far as information to help us find the key courier."

"Nope. Call me when you get that key, Agent Walker. And then I'll send out the orders for extraction." She was about to hang up when he added, "Oh and Agent Walker...Sarah...Be careful."

She hung up, growled, and then mimicked throwing the phone through the window. The way he softened his tone when he said her first name, the familiarity there. Was he trying to goad her? Or was he being sincere and was just that clueless?

And she didn't understand what in the hell was going on here, what Agent Shaw was playing at, sending them on this insanely risky mission, angling his heart out trying to send Chuck on the mission alone. Contrary to what she'd told Chuck about how the spy life was full of crazy-dangerous missions where the odds were stacked against you, this was a step beyond. Granted, Graham had sent her on suicide missions before. It was just that she'd been good enough, and sometimes lucky enough, to get out of it in one piece. Or mostly one piece. She had some scars to show for it.

She wasn't coddling Chuck. And Casey wasn't coddling him, either. They just weren't on board with sending an agent who had only been going through training (and non-traditional training at that) for a month on a suicide mission, a lion's den floating in the middle of the ocean, without some back-up. He'd be chum in the water. As it was, they were chum in the water with the two of them here. She couldn't imagine if it was just one of them.

She had to assume the NSA wanted their newly minted agent, the agent with the Intersect in his head no less, to learn on the job, not die on the job.

It was crazy. What sort of a maniac did the CIA send them? And how much of a say did General Beckman get in this? She couldn't imagine much. The NSA general was a hard-ass and tough, but she didn't tend to actively will death on her agents.

Shaw'd had almost no reaction to hearing they were surrounded by Ring agents. And it wasn't like they could hop into a van and drive the hell out of Dodge if things went south, if they were found out to be federal secret agents. They were on a God damn ship in the middle of the Caribbean, with land hundreds of miles away. They were trapped on a floating prison for the next seven days. A floating prison full of people who'd kill them without blinking if they knew they were CIA and NSA.

She needed to think. And Chuck was probably fast asleep by now, as he should be after flashing so much all at once. She could use a walk out on that promenade deck, but she didn't quite want to chance it at the moment. She couldn't help feeling like this cabin was the only safe place on the entire ship for them. And she didn't have the energy to be on her guard, watching every damn person she walked past in case they produced a knife or another silenced gun and tried to take her out.

So instead, she carefully and silently slid one of the doors to the bedroom open, sneaking in, and unbuckling her shoes. She slipped her feet out of them, walked to the bed, and set them on her side, tucking them beneath, before she oh so gently crawled onto the bed and laid out on the mattress beside him.

He was upset with her. She'd seen it, heard it, felt it. But no matter what disagreements they had, no matter what struggles were between them, the fact of the matter was that they needed one another to get off of this boat alive and with that key. She knew her fellow agents at the home base wouldn't be helping them anymore. Casey would, but she didn't know if he was currently under Shaw's thumb. And even if they were going to help, she and Chuck were stranded out here. They were on their own.

Sarah had been in situations semi-similar to this, only she'd been woefully alone then. Biding her time, waiting to make her move, knowing she might die, and if she did, she'd simply fade out of existence, like she'd never existed at all.

She wasn't alone this time. The CIA agent turned her head to look at him, his back to her as he curled up on his side. She rolled onto her own side, facing him, and she reached out tentatively. She let her fingertips rest on the cotton of the sweater vest, and then she flattened her whole hand there, and she shut her eyes.

This partnership needed to work.

Or they wouldn't survive.


A/N: Thanks for reading! Please review.

-SC and DC