Author's Note:Here is the long-awaited latest chapter of this story. I anticipate that there will be at most two more chapters before I wrap this up. I do have plans for a sequel, but it will most likely be awhile before I get to it. I want to concentrate on my other story, There Is Such Thing As Second Chances for a bit, and I'm working on another Chuck fan fic that I hope to share in the next couple of months.

Chapter 19

Chapel

U.S Naval Academy

Annapolis, Maryland

August 22, 2006

1330 Hours

"Chuck my boy! I can't tell you how glad I was to get you're call!" Chaplain (Lieutenant Commander) John Patrick O'Brien, USN said jovially, as he stood up from the desk in his office and walked around to shake Chuck's hand. "And who is this vision of loveliness?"

"Father, I'd like you to meet Sarah Walker, my fiancé," Chuck said, introducing Sarah.

"You're getting married? It's about time you moved on with you life!" Father O'Brien said, and then turned to Sarah, shaking her hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Ms. Walker. Any woman who can get Chuck out of his terminal bachelorhood must be very special indeed."

"Please, call me Sarah." Sarah said. "It's a pleasure to meet you Father, Chuck speaks very highly of you."

"Well, I should warn you, Chuck's been known to exaggerate a bit now and then," Father O'Brien said, chuckling. "Please sit down." Chuck and Sarah took a seat on a couch in the small sitting area in his office, and Father O'Brien settled into a chair across from them.

"So now, to what do I owe the pleasure of your visit, Chuck? From your phone call this morning, I get the feeling it wasn't just to share the good news about your engagement."

Chuck and Sarah looked at each other, before Chuck finally started speaking.

"Sarah and I both have some unresolved issues from our childhood and our careers that we need to work through, Father." Chuck said. "And frankly, there's nobody I trust to talk to about them other than you. It helps that I know you've got a Top Secret clearance." At this, Father O'Brien's eyebrows rose.

"Why do I have a feeling this is going to take a while?" he said.

Team Intersect Headquarters

MCB Quantico

Quantico, VA

August 23, 2006

2030 hours

"Any progress?" Harper said as he entered the room where the team's IT specialists sat. A young Asian-American woman turned to answer him.

"Not yet, sir." Himeko Nakatomi replied. "Whoever Fulcrum hired to do this encryption was world class, sir. It'll probably take at least another three days."

Harper sighed. His initial euphoria over the team having been able to retrieve the mountains of data from the Fulcrum base servers was starting to wane. This was the part of the job he hated; the waiting for actionable intelligence to be found.

"Keep me informed," he said, turning and leaving the room.

"Hey Himeko, you've worked with the Boss before this, he always this tense?" one of the junior specialists asked from his station.

"Yes." Himeko responded. "He's never been very good waiting around. Especially when he can sense we're closing in on an adversary."

Home of Jack Ryan and Dr. Cathy Mueller

Peregrine Cliffs

Calvert County, MD

August 26, 2006

1900 hours

"Dinner was delicious, Cathy." Sarah said, putting her wine glass down. She and Chuck had been invited to Jack and Cathy's home. With the threat board currently cleared, and the analysts still working on decrypting the Fulcrum servers, Harper had decided to give most of the Operations Team a 48-hour break.

"Thanks Sarah." Cathy said. "I don't get to cook for someone other than Jack that often. Glad to know I haven't lost my touch."

"So, Chuck, Sarah, you guys set a date yet?" Jack asked, grinning at the shocked faces of Chuck and Sarah.

"How...how did you know?" Chuck asked, stunned. "We haven't told anyone, not even my sister."

"Chuck, have you forgotten what I was like as your CO?" Jack said. Chuck groaned.

"Chuck?" Sarah asked.

"Jack is one of those people that was destined to work for either the CIA, NSA or FBI." Chuck said. "He always knew what was going on with the guys in our platoon, even if we tried to hide it. He's a lot like my sister; seems to have an instinctual sense when someone is hiding something."

"So, you never answered his question, guys," Cathy said.

"Not yet." Sarah replied. "We've been trying to figure out how to tell the team. And Chuck's sister."

"Well, don't worry about the team." Jack said, laughing. "Everybody's pretty much been expecting it since the first day."

"Were we that obvious?" Chuck asked.

"Yes." Jack said. Chuck and Sarah both blushed, mortified. "Anyway, as much fun as it is to tease you guys, that's not what we wanted to talk to you guys about."

"You know that my family isn't very happy about me marrying Jack." Cathy said. "They think I should be marrying another Doctor or Wall Street investment banker. Needless to say, I doubt they'll be showing up for the wedding. So I was wondering, Sarah, if you would be willing to be my Maid of Honor?"

"I'd be honored." Sarah said. "But are you sure?"

"Yes." Cathy said. "Even though this team has been together less than a year, you all feel like family."

"And Chuck, I'd like you to be my Best Man." Jack said.

"I'd love to do it," Chuck said.

Team Intersect Headquarters

MCB Quantico

Quantico, VA

August 30, 2006

1400 hours

"Eureka!" Himeko shouted, throwing her arms up in victory.

"I take it by the shouting you have good news?" Harper asked, walking into the room.

"Yes sir. We just broke the encryption on the Fulcrum servers." Himeko said.

"Good. Start running everything on it against our files." Harper said. "Also, set up a feed to the conference room with the data. Chuck and the team will also be taking a look at it."

"Will do boss." Himeko said. "I have to warn you though, there's mountains of data on the servers. It'll probably take them awhile to go through it all."

Office

Unknown Location

August 30, 2006

1430 hours

"So I was wrong." The brown-haired American said, walking into the office. "It took them a couple extra days to break it."

"Oh?" Alexi Volkoff, head of Volkoff Industries said. "And how do you know this?"

"Easy, I placed a reporting bug on one of the servers. I couldn't have it do anything other than send a brief signal when the encryption was broken, otherwise they'd detect it," the American said.

"How long until they move against Fulcrum?" Alexi asked.

"Hard to say." the American responded. "To be fair, there's terabytes of data on those servers, and I had to at least make it look like they were trying to hide the data files that had the location of Fulcrum's main base. I'd say a week at minimum before they find the info, then at least another week before they mount any sort of operation."

"Is everything in place for when that happens?"

"Yes, Alexi. Everything is in place. We'll be able to grab a significant portion of Fulcrum's money and research."

"Good." Alexi said, smiling. "You know, when you came to me all those years ago with this plan, I wasn't sure we'd be able to pull it off. I'm glad to see I was wrong. Recruiting you and your wife was the smartest decision I ever made."

Apartment

Unknown Location

August 30, 2006

1700 hours

"How did the meeting with Alexi go?" the middle-aged American woman with long black hair asked when her husband walked into the door. He walked over and pulled her into a kiss. A moment later, they pulled apart.

"Good. He still thinks we've done all this for him." he said, smiling. "In two to three weeks time, he's going to get the surprise of his life."

"And then you and I will be able to move forward with the rest of our plan." the woman said, matching his smile.

"The CIA and NSA are going to pay for what they did to us."