LB here, with part four of Versus the Ring! Firstly, thank you to the readers and reviewers! Y'all rock, and I hope you enjoy this next, slightly longer piece here. Hmm, I don't actually have too much else to say, as you know, don't own Chuck, yada yada yada; that's about it.

Enjoy!

"Don't worry Ellie—I'm sure everything's fine. In fact, why don't I check that right now? I'll just step out for a minute."

Beth was the epitome of calmness as she walked past Dr. Woodcomb and into the hallway. Once she was far enough away from the door that no one could hear her, she started muttering to herself. What on earth was the holdup? There had to be something fishy going on. Why else would the wedding have not started yet—when it was already twenty minutes late. Could something be up with Chuck? But no, the Intersect was gone—Operation Bartowski was over. She was only here until next week, and then it was Beth's turn to head out; Beckman had informed her that morning that she was likely going to Warsaw for her next mission. Man, she'd kill for a slice of pie right about now. Or some pancakes. She needed chocolate.

"Oh, hey Beth, what are you doing out in the hallway?"

Looking up, Beth saw Morgan fast approaching. "Just taking a breather. I couldn't really take one more comment about my hair being a shade too light."

As his curious glance, she elaborated. "Honey has decided that I should have dyed my hair—because 'the orange shade it is clashes with the dress'." Eyes narrowed, she started muttering under her breath. "I'll give her something that clashes…a four pound cast iron skillet upside the head ought to do the trick."

After giving her a slightly worried glance, Morgan quickly passed by, throwing a parting comment that he had to find and speak to Sarah. Hmm….that was different—why'd he have to speak to Sarah? It could only mean one thing: something was up with Chuck. Which could only mean trouble. Beth started to head back to the dressing room—whatever Morgan had to say to Sarah, well, she wanted to be there to hear it.

"Relax, Ellie, everything's going to be alright," AJ said for what seemed like the hundredth time.

First the wedding had been inexplicably stalled, then Beth had slipped out to get some air and hadn't come back, and now Sarah had disappeared too. Ellie was meditating in front of the mirror, with AJ kneeling next to her. AJ's mind was beginning to wander as she continued her mantra, when out of the corner of her eye she noticed Mr. Bartowski at the doorway.

"Ellie, chérie, I'll be right back. Just, keep doing your deep breathing exercises, okay?"

Once out of Ellie's earshot, she asked Mr. B., "What in the name of Shiva is going on?"

"There's a bit of a situation; Ted Roark is here."

AJ tilted her head in confusion. "Roark? I don't understand—?"

"He's an enemy spy; he's the one who captured me. Now he's after Charles."

"And he's here? What are we going to do?"

Mr. B. shushed AJ. "Don't worry; Charles, Sarah, and Beth have everything under control. I'm actually on my way to check on them."

"I'll come with you."

"No, no, you go check on wedding; I'm not sure Morgan's got everything under control."

AJ nodded. "Yeah, lest my ears deceive me, that's Lester singing Mr. Roboto…just, be safe, alright?"

"You too."

Slipping out of her heels, AJ ran down the hallway, accidentally snagging her dress on a potted plant along the way. Honey Woodcomb was going to kill her.

She ran into the church to find Jeff and Lester rocking out, Woody and Honey Woodcomb passing the happy flask back and forth, and Devon interrogating Morgan. Running down the aisle and up to the latter, she hissed, "Morgan, what the hell is this?"

"Chuck asked me to stall—"

"So you had Jeff and Lester give an impromptu concert? Do you realize how dangerous that is?"

He shrugged helplessly. Catching Devon's eye, AJ shook her head. Then with a sigh of resignation she approached Woody. "Mind if I have a swig?"

He handed the flask over without comment. Ah well, AJ thought, if she had to take a front row seat to this train wreck in progress, then she might as well enjoy it.

This was a disaster. An absolute disaster. Sarah and Beth were peering through the side door of the reception area—Mr. Bartowski had been kind enough to give them a route to avoid other Fulcrum members. In quiet whispers, they conversed.

"Talk about your regular ole' shotgun wedding…how we gonna play this, Sarah?"

"Good question. Not too much we can do—we'll have to work with what we have."

"Which is a lack of guns, knives, or other sharp objects that can be used as projectiles. I'm blaming Honey for this one—had she let me wear my chopsticks, I'd have knives."

Sarah let out a wry laugh. "True enough."

The blonde gestured to the table of presents, and Beth nodded. They both ducked down behind it watching Roark pace. Sarah started quietly unwrapping the presents, looking for anything that could be used as a weapon, and Beth did the same. Set of dishes: not so much. Flatware—tempting, but what was she going to do: spoon somebody to death? After the seventh or eighth package, Sarah unwrapped a set of knives. Beth silently cursed—the only good things she found were…well, nothing much. There was some towels (good for soaking up blood?) and some crystal glasses. She kept unwrapping presents, but was thrown off when Chuck dashed through the door

Roark had just been about to cut the cake when Chuck yelled, "Don't you dare!"

Sarah gasped next to Beth while Chuck continued.

"If you ever want to see the Intersect again, you will not touch anything in this room. Do I make myself clear? Today is my sister's wedding day, and trust me, you don't want to see her angry!"

Beth winced. This wasn't good. It's never good when things didn't happen according to plan. Beth watched the interaction with interest and some anxiety, all the while still unwrapping presents in search of something to be used as a weapon.

"Where's the Intersect, Chuck?" Beth saw Sarah twitch next to her as Roark's men aimed their guns toward Chuck.

"Wait, I brought an Intersect!"

Beth watched with some shock as Bryce walked in. What the hell? He…shouldn't have been at the wedding. Beth knew he was going to be part of the new Intersect project; it's just…he wasn't supposed to show up at the wedding. The conversation continued on while the unwrapped packages started adding up. Just when Beth was about to silently scream, she unwrapped a set of cast iron cookware. Jackpot! Bludgeoning people to death—that, she could do. She would have cheered, except she had to be quiet, and things looked to be going bad. Roark cocked his shotgun, and pointed it at Chuck.

"Fulcrum wants Chuck here dead no matter what …shoot Mr. Bartowski."

"—Sarah, now!"

Sarah threw a knife towards one of the men by Chuck, and everyone scattered. Beth grabbed the biggest skillet of the cast-iron set, and started beating up whoever came close. One got pretty close to Sarah, and Beth launched her skillet, hoping Sarah didn't move to the left any. The skillet ended up smacking one of the Fulcrum men in the leg, and Beth picked up a nearby centerpiece and hurled it at the man's head. Everything looked to be going alright, but then Sarah ran out of knives, and Bryce ran out of bullets.

"That guy singing; his name's Lester. I kissed him once," AJ said, taking another drink from the flask before passing it back.

"That's terrible," Woody said, shaking his head and taking a swig of his own.

"I know it. I did it to save Morgan's butt, too, and he's thanked me by announcing he's gonna run off to Hawaii with that skank Anna."

Honey asked, "Which ones are they?" After a few drinks from the happy flask, she'd really loosened up, and AJ found herself having a much better time with the Awesomes listening to Jeffster blast out Mr. Roboto than she ever would have thought possible.

"Morgan's the one who introduced the band. And Anna's the Asian girl sitting behind Big Mike, the rather healthy-looking black man."

Woody and Honey both nodded. "She does seem slutty," Honey said as she took a sip of her own. "And who on earth did her make-up?"

"The undead, probably. I honestly don't know what Morgan sees in her."

"You and he would make a much better couple," Woody said.

AJ gave a very unladylike snort. "Morgan and me? Nah. I'm a free spirit, and Morgan, Morgan's going to Hawaii. Besides, we've known each other since we were kids, it'd never work."

Woody shrugged. "My mistake."

"Oh, nonsense, you obviously like him," Honey argued. "Just look at the way you—what happened to your dress?"

Taking another sip of liquid courage, AJ answered, "I tore it on a plant. Kind of on purpose. Because really, Honey, it's a hideous dress, don't you think?"

Before she could answer, Devon idled over to them and grabbed the drinking flask. "Okay you three, I think that's enough for you."

"Eh, there's hardly any left anyway. All yours, Captain," AJ said.

He frowned, but took a drink just as Jeffster hit the chorus.

Well, this wasn't good. Sarah was out of knives; Beth had no more odds and ends to knock people out with—they were officially up the creek without the paddle. She watched with growing horror as Roark readied to shoot Chuck. This was it. No way out of this one. After a decidedly unfunny pun on Roark's part, everyone watched in silence, waiting for that final shot to ring out.

Well, mostly silence. It was low at first, a slight hum that Beth immediately dismissed as a faulty air conditioner. But the hum grew louder. Covertly glancing up, she saw black parachutes cross the roof. Well that was unexpected. Finally seeing something amiss, Roark looked up, and dodged just out of the way. Pulling herself to the left, Beth elbowed her captor and dove down behind a table as a number of Special Forces agents shot their way through the enemies. She kept her head down; she really didn't want to end up injuring herself because of idiocy.

"All clear, sir."

A voice sounded from the corner of the room, and Beth watched as others started to crawl out of their hiding spots. She stood, stretching her arms out and carefully brushing away some glass bits from her dress. She turned to ask how Sarah and Chuck were (and Bryce too, but she didn't really know him, so she wasn't as concerned) when she was distracted by an image in her peripheral. There, in probably two tons of Kevlar, a bulky helmet, and looking just as dashing as ever, was John.

"The time has come at last—"

"Secret, secret, I've got a secret!" AJ sang along. As the tempo of the song had picked up, she could've sworn she heard shots being fired and glass breaking in the reception area, so in an effort to distract herself from the horrible scenarios running through her mind, and to hopefully keep the other guests from wondering what all the commotion was, she'd started singing along and had moved to face the awaiting crowd so that she was directing them all to sing along.

"To throw away the mask," Lester sang. Admittedly, for a lesbian Indian (as Woody had christened him), he had a pretty good voice.

"Secret, secret, I've got a secret!" And wasn't that the truth? This spy business was crazy; AJ'd only just found out about it and already, here she was, helping to cover it up. This was way more stressful than traveling the world.

"Now everyone can see—"

"Secret, secret, I've got a secret!"

"My true identity," Lester went on. Then, just as he was about the reach the end of the song, Jeff pulled out the pyrotechnics for the grand finale. Oh God.

AJ shouted out, "No, Jeff, no!", running forward to stop him and deepening the tear in her dress in the process, but it was too late. As Lester belted out, "I'm Kilroy! Kilroy! Kilroy!" Jeff set off the sparklers and the sprinklers went off, drenching everyone.

Rounding on Morgan, AJ shouted through the drizzle, "Why in the hell did you let them bring fireworks to a wedding?"

Sarah and Chuck went to go find Ellie while John's men began to 'clean up'. John was busy giving orders; he hadn't noticed her yet. Beth helped where she could, mostly in tending a gunshot wound or two—some kind guest had thankfully (and unknowingly) donated their sewing machine essentials kit so Beth could stitch up the wounds. She was focused on the task at hand, and after finally stitching up the last man, she sighed and closed her eyes. What a day. A tiring, crazy day. And they said weddings in Tennessee were bad.

"Ma'am, you should go—you shouldn't be here."

She looked up to see one of the men (she had no idea who he was) looking sternly at her. Wait, did he just call her ma'am? How old did he think she was?

"Umm…pardon?"

"Problem, Miles?"

Miles snapped to attention. "Colonel Casey. There's a civilian. She needs to be relocated."

"She's not a civilian."

Beth looked up at him, her smile just barely hidden. "Always one to make an entrance, eh John? How'd you know to come?"

The soldier's eyebrows rose at the intimate use of his Colonel's first name. But neither Beth nor John noticed—both were too focused on looking at each other.

"Bartowski called. What happened to your dress?"

She glanced down to see where John was pointing. A jagged rip went from her stomach down her side a ways. That would explain the breeze she felt. Well, not much she could do about it now.

"Oh, you know—the usual. Fighting crimes, kicking ass, taking names. Damaging dresses is just part of the job."

"Colonel…?"

"Without sparing his man a glance, he rattled off a list of orders, his eyes never once leaving Beth's face. The man disappeared, and Beth was struck how easy it was for John to command. He was a natural born leader. Eyes twinkling, Beth started to laugh. At John's questioning glance, she spoke.

"Now, it may just be me, but if you had wanted to be my date, you could have come through the front door—I'm sure they'd have let you in."

He stepped closer to her, not touching her, but close enough so that Beth could feel the heat of his body, and if she listened closely, she could hear the rhythm of his heart. Or it may have been the ending notes of Mr. Roboto—they sounded similar.

John began to speak, but his words were drowned out by a loud ringing throughout the building. Without warning, the sprinkler system turned on, soaking all in the room. She detected a faint smile on his lips, and laughed at the absurdity of it all. Talk about a wedding from hell. Reaching up, she took John's helmet off.

"If I'm gonna be soaked, you might as well be too. Using a helmet to shade yourself isn't fair."

"I came prepared—besides, you look…"

He trailed off, taking in her appearance. She blushed, but grinned nonetheless. "Well it's not really my fault. I didn't choose to wear this dress. And I look…soaked? Like a drowned rat? Cause that's what I feel like—what kind of people bring pyrotechnics to a wedding? Though that does save us from having to…"

"Just shut up and kiss me."

She shut her mouth, then opened it again. "Is that an order, Colonel?"

And without waiting for an answer, she wrapped her arms around him, kissing him fiercely. She didn't care it was pouring water on them. Didn't care about a thing in the world except for him. He was real, here in front of her. They kissed as if they'd been apart for years, when it had been less than twenty-four hours since they'd been apart. Lord, Beth thought, if she could make a living by just kissing him all day, she would. It was nirvana. Vaguely, she heard commotion in the background, but at the moment she didn't really give a damn.

Finally pulling away, she realized what the commotion was. John's men were still in the room. And they were clapping. Not only that, but they cheered, slapped John on the back, and did that weird 'ooh-rah rah' cheer they were famous for. Beth wasn't used to having a crowd watch her make the moves on her man, but John didn't seem to mind. In fact, in one of those rare occasions, he was genuinely smiling. Not a happy smile, but more of a contented smirk. Wearing a smirk of her own, she winked at him.

"Well, soldier, seems like they're cheering for us. Care for an encore?"

LB: Well wasn't that fun! We're almost halfway done with VTR, and we haven't even got to the best parts yet! So, to recap: When in doubt, drink from a happy flask, cookery can also double as weapons, and ugly dresses will Always get ripped. Oh, and never, I repeat, ever let strange men like Jeff and Lester bring fireworks to a wedding. Or any indoor venue, actually. Until next time!

AC: Epic summary LB. & can't believe we're almost 1/2way through, I'd better get writing on season 3 drabbles. Am I the only 1 who loved the amazing BCness at the end? You should review & let us know ;)