Monday, February 18th, 12:10 pm PST, Buy More Parking Lot
Whistling a happy tune, Chuck floated across the Buy More plaza parking lot. Sarah Walker had kissed him, and in public no less. This was no chaste cover kiss. This was no a-bomb-is-ticking-down-and-we're-about-to-die kiss. This was a kiss for no other reason than, well, wanting to kiss him, and the job be damned for once.
Chuck giddily sashayed between an import sedan and an SUV. Without really thinking about it, he shot a double Isaac, dual pointing index fingers coupled with a cheesy grin, at a suddenly bewildered woman. She yanked her shopping cart to a halt, threatening to topple both the boxed flat screen TV and the little girl riding shotgun. His grin was so large that there really were only two possible responses: answer with a similar grin or call 911 to see if the local asylum was short one nut case. The pig-tailed girl let out a giggle as her freckled nose wrinkled. Her mother's eyes darted around like she was trying to remember where she'd stashed her phone.
He winked at the little girl as he passed. The sounds of crooked wheels on rough blacktop faded behind him as he crossed another aisle. Impulsively, he stopped in a vacant parking spot. He felt like shouting something to the skies, but words were inadequate. Instead, he simply stretched out his arms to his sides and tilted his head back as he basked in the glow of the midday sun. Clumps of his careless hair shifted slightly in the gentle breeze. He couldn't remember ever being so happy. With a contented sigh, he lowered chin and arms and continued his trek. Work beckoned.
When he went to check his watch, he found only pale skin and the slight jut of his wrist bone. Alarmed, he patted his pockets, but then a small sigh of relief escaped his lips when he remembered that he had dropped the watch off to be fixed that morning. The watch was running fast again, and even though he could track how fast it was running, every time he checked the time he was initially disconcerted. He disliked the sensation that time was somehow slipping away from him.
Sure, the watch was a relatively cheap model with its metal band and hard-to-read LED display seated beneath the more traditional hands. Sure, it had only been a cover gift. Still, it was a gift from Sarah, and as their relationship grew more and more real, the watch grew more and more important to Chuck.
Altering course, he headed, somewhat ironically, for the spy shop across the plaza. His friend Jay should have finished fixing the watch by now. In exchange, Chuck would do a little more work on the store's computer system. Big Mike probably would have had a conniption if he knew Chuck were bartering away services that the spy shop might normally pay Buy More to do, but then again Big Mike had a conniption when the strip mall bakery ran out of danishes.
Behind him, an annoyed voice bellowed, "Bartowski! Where do you think you're going?"
Chuck stopped and turned. John Casey, threatening to have a conniption of his own, stood near the front entrance of the Buy More. He wore his regulation green Buy More polo and his regulation glare. Not one for patience, he broke into a jog, covering huge expanses of ground with each seemingly effortless stride. Short brown hair that received less attention than Chuck's nonetheless remained fixed, as if held in place by sheer force of will. But all that took a back seat to those eyes, manic and commanding, drilling into Chuck like a Texas oilman.
Chuck didn't have any kind of urge to reach for his phone. This particular nut case was on his side, and he was grateful for that.
Casey didn't pull up until he was a little closer than was considered socially acceptable. Chuck returned the man's stare with a practiced calmness. As fun as rattling Casey's cage could be, he decided to pre-empt a blow-up by answering the man's question. "I've got a little work to do over at the spy shop. I should be back in about an hour."
Casey appeared almost determined to find something wrong with that. When he was unable to come up with anything, he seemed to take it personally. "OK, but before you go, we need to have a little chat about Agent Walker."
Chuck swallowed hard. Had Casey seen the kiss? As usual, the man was unreadable. Chuck tried to force himself to relax, with limited success. "Wh-hat about Agent Walker?"
"I'm starting to hear some chatter I don't like. How's she acted towards you since she returned from South America?"
"Constant as the North Star."
"What the hell does that mean?"
"Well, what kind of question is that? She's, you know, Sarah. Calm, cool, professional. Always focused on the mission at hand, but occasionally friendly. Same as always."
"How friendly? She hasn't been flirting with you or anything like that, has she?"
"Casey, is there a point to all this?"
Casey glanced around the parking lot. Conspiratorially, he offered, "Something big is coming down. I don't know what it is, but she may be trying to cozy up to you in preparation."
Chuck's mouth was suddenly hanging open. "What, so suddenly we're back to where we were at the beginning, back when Doctor Zarnow was messing with our heads and none of us trusted each other?"
"Things change. Look, I know you slept with Carina, which is neither here nor there. But doesn't it strike you as strange that Sarah wouldn't be bothered that you slept with her sister? Doesn't sound like any woman I've ever known."
"She'd tell me if there was a problem. Sarah has always been honest with me."
"As far as you know. Either one of us could put something by you without breaking a sweat."
Chuck gave Casey a pointed look. "Like you might be doing now?"
"It's your funeral. Word to the wise, Bartowski: don't trust Walker. We both know how you feel about her, but if I'm right and something is about to go down, she'll use your feelings against you. Do yourself a favor and do your thinking with your big head." Casey lowered his gaze meaningfully to Chuck's nether regions before turning and heading back to the Buy More.
When Casey had put some distance between them, Chuck turned and exhaled hard before he continued towards the spy shop. He didn't like hiding things from anyone, let alone Casey. Despite being a general pain-in-the-ass, there were few better partners on a mission. He had saved Chuck's life more times than Chuck cared to count.
Still, at the moment Casey was managing to be a larger pain-in-the ass than usual, because his words were difficult to dismiss out of hand.
One thing Chuck had never been able to reconcile was that he had slept with Carina one night, and Sarah had showed up at his door and kissed him the following night. Casey was right. The timing of it all was more than a little strange. Ever since Sarah returned from her mission abroad, for the first time, things between him and Sarah seemed to be progressing like any garden-variety relationship with one of the CIA's best should.
What Casey was suggesting would certainly help explain why Sarah had changed her mind about the whole thing. It would explain how the beautiful CIA agent ended up with the Buy More nerd. The very thought hurt. Maybe he really was just an assignment, and Sarah Walker was simply extraordinarily good at her job.
Chuck's brow furrowed as he stepped up onto a sidewalk. Could she really have been playing him all this time? Everything she had done seemed so sincere. Just the echoes of the lunchtime kiss were enough to make him feel like he was floating through the air again.
No, he decided. Sarah couldn't be faking what she had shown lately. There was no faking that kind of kiss, or countless other moments since her return.
By the time he reached the spy shop, he had shaken off his doubts. He may not understand the intelligence world, but he understood what his heart was telling him, and his heart told him he could trust Sarah. Casey was just playing some kind of game by preying on Chuck's insecurities. That had to be it.
Feeling better, he started whistling as he opened the door to the spy shop, cheekily labeled "Spy Hard" in large painted letters across the front window. Inside was a narrow but long store, with row upon row of floor-to-ceiling shelving containing new and used equipment of varying usefulness to security experts and would-be spies alike. Cheap fluorescent lights provided inadequate lighting, which would have lent the store the authentic feel of a covert back room if not for the incessant buzzing and occasional flickering in some of the antiquated units.
The front counter was vacant. In fact, there was no sign of anyone in the store. "Jay?" Chuck called.
For a moment, nobody answered. Then, "Chuck? That you?"
"Yep."
"I'm in the back."
He placed Jay's slightly hoarse voice as coming from the back right corner of the store, so Chuck navigated the aisle along the right wall. Along the way, he idly stopped to examine a strange cylinder that caught his eye. It turned out to be a cheap spy scope. He had recently used a scope at least twenty times as powerful – and one quarter the size.
He set the scope back on the shelf and kept heading back, idly humming a tune as he went. Up ahead, Jay was hunched over a small workbench in a dim corner, working intently. He was examining the watch using a small screwdriver and an even smaller probe. "Find the problem?" Chuck asked.
The man's lean face turned to look up at Chuck, his skin even whiter than normal. "I found a problem," he said in a strained voice.
Chuck let out a small laugh. "What's the matter, man?"
The wheels of the rolling desk chair rattled as Jay stood up. He awkwardly backed away, a wary expression on his face. "See for yourself."
His friend was acting very strangely. It was almost as if the man were afraid to turn his back. Chuck gave Jay a puzzled grin and walked to the desk.
The watch sat face-down on the work bench with the back cover removed. A lamp mounted a long spring-hinged arm cast spotlighted the watch under an unusually bright light. Chuck didn't notice anything unusual, just the usual workings of a watch. He shrugged. "What?"
"Look along the far side of the case."
Checking where Jay indicated, Chuck spotted a tiny, flat black plastic chip clinging to the inside of the watch. A light intermittently flashed an incensed red, like a sinister eye flapping open and then snapping shut just as quickly. Thin black wires coiled from the chip to a mount sporting a battery that, on closer examination, seemed out-of-place in the cheap watch.
A device of some kind was inside Chuck's watch. The watch that Sarah gave him. The watch that Sarah had promised him contained no spy equipment of any kind.
A knot formed in the pit of Chuck's stomach.
Jay's eyed Chuck as if watching a coiled viper. "Chuck? What the hell is that thing?" he demanded with a mixture of fear and awe.
Chuck slowly bent over to examine the device more closely. Tilting the watch to the side between his thumb and forefinger, he managed to read 'AXG223g' where it was etched into the casing in block white letters.
The model number caused Chuck's eyelids to flutter and grow heavy.
A black crow sitting on the branch of a tree.
A spec sheet on the device.
A directive indicating that these devices should only be used in the highest priority missions.
An attachment memo discussing use of the "g" series of the device.
A video of a man collapsing to the ground in the middle of a crowded park.
The crow in the tree.
Chuck's mouth went dry. Suddenly numb fingers carefully lowered the watch back to the table and then lifted away to hang limply at his side.
The black chip housed a high-powered, self-contained GPS tracking device. However, the truly frightening part was that, when mounted on a conductive surface such as a metallic watch band, this particular version was capable of delivering a single electric charge capable of sending a person into ventricular fibrillation.
In other words, the person would die of a heart attack.
Chuck's phone rang. Unconsciously pulling the phone out of his pants pocket, he glanced down at the display and saw Sarah's face smiling back at him.
"Don't freak out," Chuck whispered under his breath.