A/N: This a little shorter than usual but I wanted to get something out to all of you who enjoy this little tale…and thanks to everyone who has taken the time to alert, favorite and/or review. Remember, I don't own Chuck, I don't make money doing this and any and all errors are my own because I do this beta-free. Still having fun so thanks to Jim for the nudge. JT
A/N:33 I recently published Chapter 1 of Sarah Walker-Broken Beyond Repair and invited anyone who wanted to to come play in the sandbox so if you're interested, check it out. Story ideas, chapters, one-shots...any and everything is
Bryce Larkin - Douche Bag At Large - Chapter 19
Chuck Bartowski sat on the edge of the courtyard's fountain, staring up at the surprisingly clear night sky. He'd been watching the front entrance, waiting for Sarah to appear, wondering what kind of mood the blonde would been in when she showed up, hoping it would be the playful Sarah and not the sometimes scary Agent Walker. He'd been anticipating her arrival but after five minutes he'd happened to glance upwards and been mesmerized to find that some trick of the weather had provided a cloudless and, even more shocking, smog free view of the stars.
Silently naming the constellations as he recognized them, he'd gotten through the big dipper, the small dipper, Sagittarius, Taurus, Leo and when he recognized and then named Orion, he'd nearly cried out after the intersect kicked in and dumped an unbelievably large amount of knowledge into his head, the sheer size of the flash giving him a huge headache that seemed to center itself in the middle of his forehead.
The wave of dizziness and nausea the accompanied the flash made him grateful that he was sitting because he was sure he would have fallen if he'd been standing. Bending forward, he allowed his head to drop into his hands while he took deep, steadying breaths, trying to keep the contents of his stomach from ending up on the ground between his feet. Closing his eyes in an attempt to fight of the nearly overpowering feeling of vertigo, he reached a hand out and scooped a little of the fountain's cold water and then splashed it on his forehead, hoping the change in temperature might help to lessen the headache that continued to pound behind his eyes.
Despite having his eyes closed and his ears ringing, he knew when Sarah had entered the courtyard, the light breeze that got there before her carrying with it the faint smell of citrus and vanilla. He lifted his head and had a second to regret his action before his eyes rolled back in his head and he felt his body pitch forward…and then he didn't feel a thing.
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Sarah had parked her Porsche and was making her way towards the courtyard of the apartment complex when she caught sight of Chuck, sitting on the edge of the fountain with his head cradled in his hands. Worried that something might be wrong, she increased her pace and had taken two steps into the courtyard when she saw Chuck's head lift from his hands and then, moments later, pitch forward onto the concrete, his unmoving body shooting a bolt of pure panic through her body.
Five quick steps brought her to Chuck's side and moments later she was kneeling with his head cradled in her lap, her fingers brushing the curls from his forehead while she did a quick visual inspection, looking for any outwards sign of whatever could be causing his condition. Finding nothing during her quick inspection, Sarah put two fingers on his neck and breathed a sigh of relief when she found a strong and steady pulse.
Reaching into her pocket, she pulled out her phone and was about to push the emergency alert button but paused when the sound of a door opening behind her let her know that Casey would soon be on scene. Slipping her phone back into her pocket, she looked over her shoulder and after confirming that the big NSA agent would soon be there, she looked back down just as Chuck's eyes opened.
"Chuck? What happened? Are you alright? What's wrong? What's…"
"Sarah, slow down" Chuck said, lifting his hand and gently placing a finger against her lips. "I'm fine, just a little headache" he added.
"Chuck, you just fainted, so you're not fine" she answered, taking the finger he'd been holding to her lips and wrapping it between her hands. "Do you have any idea what happened?"
"What's wrong with the moron?" John Casey asked, looking down at the pair.
"I just got a little dizzy" Chuck answered, looking up at the big man who was now standing next to them, his robe hanging open to reveal his black sweat pants and a 'Ronald Reagan Forever' t-shirt. "Really, Casey, forever?"
"Well, if you're feeling good enough to question The President's place in history, I guess I don't need to call an emergency crew to get your head out of Walker's lap" the big man said before turning and stomping away. "Next time you decide to put your face in Walker's mommy parts, how about doing it behind closed doors" he added over his shoulder and then turned again, missing the one fingered salute from his two partners.
"Chuck, do you feel like getting up?" Sarah asked with a look of slight concern.
"Yeah, I think I'm ok" Chuck answered, sitting up and moving slowly to sit up. "My head still hurts" he added as he got to slowly to his feet.
Sarah moved closer and snaked an arm around Chuck's waist when he started walking towards the apartment. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"It was an Intersect flash. The biggest one I've ever experienced."
"Flash?"
"Yeah, that's what I call it when the Intersect activates and feeds me information" he replied, realizing that the woman at his side had no real idea of how the thing in his head actually worked. When he noticed the quizzical look on her face, he decided that he needed to explain to her just what the program in his head did. "I'm going to take a quick shower and then, if you want to stick around, I think I should tell you what I know about this program in my head" he added, tapping a finger to his head before guiding through the front door of Casa Bartowski.
"Not to sound all girly, but do you think we could snuggle while you tell me how your brain works?" Sarah asked with a soft growl.
Chuck couldn't help but smile. "That's your question? I figured you'd ask to wash my back."
"I have to ask?" she replied while dropping her arm from his waist and going to work on the buttons on her blouse, dropping the garment and starting on her jeans before they'd reached the bathroom. "Your sister and Devon are both working an overnight, right?"
"Yeah, I think so. Why?"
"Because I really don't want 'CB' showing up while we're in the shower. You owe me, Mr. Bartowski."
"I owe you?" Chuck asked and then lifted his arms over his head so Sarah could pull off his t-shirt, her eagerness leaving no doubt that his clothes would be coming off, with or without his help.
"Oh yeah, after that little strip tease earlier and then, leaving me hanging at the beach…yeah, you owe me" she stated while her hands made short work of his belt and then the buttons on his 501s.
Before he could think of a suitable response, his jeans and boxers were both pooled around his ankles and he barely had the chance to step out of them before Sarah was dragging him towards the shower, her hand firmly gripping his 'un-official' handle.
"I still have a headache."
"And 'someone' doesn't seem to be affected by your headache" Sarah replied, closing the glass door behind them and urging him to join her under the pulsing shower spray.
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The shower had lasted until the water started to loose it's warmth and their aquatic activities had moved to the bedroom after a brief break to dry themselves and a glass of ice water.
"You realize that we're all sweaty again, right?" Chuck had managed to gasp out while trying to catch his breath,
"And you're complaining?" Sarah wheezed back, just as short of breath as the nerd who was looking up into her eyes.
"Not at all. Just pointing out that we're probably going to have to take another shower."
"I know, isn't that great?" Sarah asked with a smile, rolling to the side and snuggling against her partner. "How's that headache, Mr. Bartowski?" she whispered into his ear before grabbing his earlobe between her teeth and giving it a playful tug.
"Gone. It's a medical miracle. Can I call you whenever I have a headache?" he asked, adding an eyebrow wiggle.
"Of course you can. I'll always be willing to help you get over a headache" Sarah responded and then leaned in and nibbled at Chuck's neck. "Now, promised to tell me what happened earlier."
"I did?"
"Well, technically, you told me you'd explain how your brain works and, if that had anything to do with what happened in the courtyard, then I think you should explain it all to me" Sarah answered, raising up on an elbow to look into the brown eyes that seemed to have such an effect on her. "So, let's hear it" she practically demanded, lowering herself back down so her head could rest on his chest.
"All right. You know the Intersect…"
"Chuck, I'm not an idiot. I may not be as smart as you but please just talk to me like I can make sense of whatever you say. I promise, if anything really confuses me, I'll ask you to dumb it down…ok?"
"Yes ma'am" he answered with a smile and then placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. "When I first uploaded the Intersect, I had no control over what could cause information 'dumps' which I started thinking of as 'flashes'. It took a few days and several bottles of aspirin for the headaches that the flashes would cause before I was able to reprogram the Intersect."
"You re-programmed the program?" Sarah asked, realizing that she sounded a little awed and 'with good reason' she told herself. Everything she'd heard and read about the Intersect lead her to believe it was one of the most sophisticated programs in existence, having taken dozens of the greatest scientific minds that the US Government could find many years to write and the man she was cuddling with had re-written the program in a few days?
"Well…yes. I found the base code and re-wrote and re-structured it so I could access the information with greater ease and less headaches."
"So, what happened in the courtyard?"
"Well I was sitting there, thinking about how I'd acted a little immature earlier in the evening and I was thinking about how I could apologize. I happened to look up and, for some strange reason, noticed how clear the sky was. I started finding and naming the different constellations and when I got to Orion the hunter, the combination of the image and the name unlocked a huge freaking information dump. Bigger than anything I've ever 'flashed' on before. I don't know how long the 'flash' lasted but when it ended, my head felt like it was going to explode. I remember smelling you and when I looked up, that's when blacked out"
"You mean fainted, right?"
"Please, Sarah, blacked out sounds so much manlier."
"Ok, Chuck, you blacked out…why? What's so special about Orion the hunter?"
"Not Orion the hunter, just Orion. He was the lead scientist for the original Intersect project and when I flashed, all of this information that he'd included in his original programming suddenly opened."
"What kind of information?" Sarah asked, suddenly very worried about whatever Chuck had flashed on.
"Sarah, I can't tell you"
"Why not, Chuck?"
"Because there was just to much. Imagine the initial Intersect download was like a really good library at a small college"
"Ok, I think I get what you're saying."
"Well, the information that Orion had included with but hidden within his programming would be like the Library of Congress compared to the smaller library."
"Chuck, how could a person's brain possibly contain that much information?
"I don't know. What little I got from the brief skim I did of Orion's notes indicates that he figured out some way to store information at the cellular level."
"But Chuck, countless cells die every day so how could that possibly work?"
"Sarah, I just don't know. When I have the time I plan to review all of Orion's notes but, once again going on what little I looked at, once the Intersect program was uploaded to me, the program modified itself and now keeps moving the information, making sure that nothing is lost by moving anything from unhealthy or dying cells into newly produced cells."
"So, on the simplest level, the library books keep getting moved whenever a section of the 'library' get destroyed…but"
"Sarah, I don't know more, yet. I plan to find out but for now, I'd rather that Graham and Beckman don't now about the extent of my new knowledge."
"But what if you keep getting headaches, Chuck? Is it safe to have all of those 'books' floating around in your head?"
"It's not about all of those 'books', Sarah. It's not even about the back ups for the books or the back-ups for the back-ups. It was just the sudden unlocking of all of Orion's hidden information that briefly overloaded the system" Chuck said while lightly tapping the side of his head. "I'm fine and now I've got all of this new information that I can access" he added with a smile.
"Oh really, like what, Mr. Smartypants?"
"Well, I know how the Egyptians made beer, I know dozens of different forms of meditation, I have how to books for just about everything, I…"
"Hold on Chuck"" Sarah said with a strangely hungry smile. "I think a demonstration might be in order, Ok?"
"Uh, yeah, I guess so. What did you have in mind?"
Sarah through a leg across Chuck's waist and moments later had her hands resting on his chest while she stared into his eyes. "First, pull up the meditation section."
Chuck blinked his eyes once. "Done."
"Now, pull up the ancient 'how to' section."
"Done" he responded after another blink.
"Now…" Sarah said before leaning forward and whispering into his ear.
"Tantric meditation and the what?" Chuck coughed out, his eyes opened to twice their normal diameter as he sat bolt upright in bed.
A/N:2 - Next time, Chuck asks the powers that be about…no, not that…about Orion.