A/N: Onward.
The Missionary
Eastern to Mountain, third-party call, the lines are down
The wise man built his words upon the rocks
But I'm not bound to follow suit
The trees will bend, the conversation's dimmed
Go build yourself another home, this choice isn't mine
I'm sorry, I'm sorry
Did you never call? I waited for your call
These rivers of suggestion are driving me away
The ocean sang, the conversation's dimmed
Go build yourself another dream, this choice isn't mine
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry
— REM, South Central Rain
Chapter Fifty: Decisions, Decisions
Stanfield left Chuck and Sarah in a huge bedroom and led Casey to another room down and across the hall. Sarah could hear the two men talking quietly as she closed the door. Then she could hear them no longer.
She turned to find Chuck already seated on the side of the king bed, facing her. — Or he would have been facing her if his head had been up and not in his hands, as it was. His head seemed to be too heavy for his shoulders. Sarah understood his posture.
His exhaustion, his demoralization.
She felt the same.
They were both ensnared in the past, hoping for freedom in a future that felt infinitely far away. Her past was too dark; his was too complicated. Their hope seemed all but vain. Nothing since the cabin, except for making it here, safely, to Stanfield's Richmond home, was a clear reason for encouragement.
Beyond Chuck's slumped shoulders and downcast face, through the large window, Sarah could see that snow was falling again, falling into white sheets folded around the ankles of small, bare trees in the back garden. Sarah had hardly noticed the garden when they walked from the garage: she had been too intent on Chuck and on putting one foot in front of the other. She hadn't noticed the snow return: she had been too intent on Chuck and Stanfield.
"You want the shower first, Chuck?" The bedroom had its own bath, visible through an open door. She crossed to a chair near the bed where Chuck was sitting, gesturing to the open door as she did.
He looked up at her as she sat down. "No, you go first."
She shook her head. "I'm happy to wait."
He seemed to bite the inside of his cheek, studying her, his eyes dull, tired. "That woman, Marat's assassin — don't take her to heart, Sarah."
Sarah inhaled and exhaled. "You mean my patron saint?" The fears that accumulated since leaving the cabin, her mounting anxieties, made her choose those words, made her tone hard.
"Don't, Sarah," Chuck pleaded, his tone soft, his voice almost a whisper, his eyes closing then opening, "don't let Stanfield's cautionary reminder upset you, make you believe…"
Sarah looked into his eyes. "But Chuck, I want a future with you. With…all that entails." There, I said it. "I'm not asking for a commitment, only telling you how I feel, what I hope for, or want to hope for…" She could not bring herself to say 'house' or 'family' but she realized her eyes likely confessed what her lips did not supply. She tensed, gathering herself, then plunged on. "But, look at who I am, Chuck, who I've been. You know better than anyone. I'm not fit for a human future; I don't belong in normal life. Faith, hope, love — Chuck, don't they require grace? So how can a demon ever possess them?" She dropped her chin, consulting the floor, as if it held some answer to the questions tormenting her.
Chuck moved toward her, kneeling in front of her chair, making her look at him by moving into her line of vision. His movement seemed sympathetic but also frustrated.
"Sarah, stop. You're wrung out, and I am too, both of us — too much that means so much in too little time. We've only just found each other, really, and we're reeling, trying to see the future, a path forward for us." He paused, putting his index finger under her chin and gently tilting her face up to him so that he could lessen his crouch. "I want that too, Sarah, a future with you," she saw relief in his shoulders when he admitted that (he had been anxious too, she realized) "all that that entails," he quoted her phrase back to her and, delighted, she wanted to lean forward and kiss him, "but right now, we have to face the day. Today. Today's what we have. You are neither a demon nor Charlotte Corday redux. I am neither my father nor the next Green Lantern. You're Sarah, I'm Chuck — and we're together, you know, together-together."
He stopped for a moment and grinned despite everything, lifting one eyebrow, as he squeezed one of her hands, calling attention to the junior-high phrasing he had deliberately used. "We are dating exclusively, right?"
A chortle escaped Sarah and she looked at him in wonder. She adored the way he could put her world back on its axis. She no longer felt hopeless.
Scooting to the edge of her chair, she did lean forward and took him into her arms. They would talk more later. Now she could shower and sleep.
"Yes, exclusively."
Ellie was forced into a chair, hard and unforgiving, her body forcibly bent.
She felt the hands move on her, moving to her shoulders, steadying her in her seat.
The voice she had heard earlier issued another order. "Take the bag off her head, free her hands.."
A moment later Ellie was blinded by the light; she felt dizzy and would likely have fallen out of the chair if the hands were not on her again, holding her in place. The light made her blink, and it seemed to summon nausea. She felt sick; she knew that the sickness was artificial, not natural.
The drug. The dart.
She kept blinking and rubbed her eyes and eventually her vision began to clear. A tall black man in an expensive three-piece suit stood before her, one hand under his chin, the other hand supporting the first hand's elbow. Rodin's The Thinker, Ellie thought, surprising herself. She thought medical school had chased her undergraduate art history minor from her head. He studied her like she was a museum exhibit, a shard of delicate, ancient pottery on a display pedestal.
"Can you see me? Good morning, Ellie. I am — "
"I know who you are, you shit. You're Langston Graham." As her vision cleared, she matched the face to newspaper photos she had seen, TV news reports. Even groggy, her mind was fast. Family trait.
She regretted naming him after she did it.
Play dumb, Ellie. Trust no one, especially not this son of a bitch.
He gave Sarah her orders.
"So you know me," he said, dropping his arms and taking a step toward her. "Good, that saves us time, introductions." He paused and considered her again. She knew she must be a mess, her hair this way and that from the black bag. Her short nightdress suddenly seemed shorter than it had seemed at home, when it was for Devon's eyes, although there was no lechery in Graham's.
Only business. His sort of business.
"Where am I?" She demanded, letting her anger boil into her tone. Being ignorant was something she'd never been able to tolerate. She liked to know, to be in the know. In that, she was more her mother's daughter than her father's.
Graham regarded her mildly as if she had not spoken or he had not heard her. A moment later, though, he responded but in a detached tone: "The question, Ellie, is not where you are, but why you are. I'm afraid I have bad news to break to you. Your brother is dead. He died when a rogue faction of agents, calling themselves Fulcrum, attacked a CIA facility. This sad fact has prompted me to take the rather extreme action that brings you here."
Ellie's eyes watered, bile rose in her throat and she gagged. She was not sure she could have resisted tears anyway, but with the drug still in her system, she had no chance. She felt the warm water trail down her cheeks. A moment later, she vomited — a short bout of dry heaves.
"I'm sorry," Graham continued, his voice monotonic, no reaction to her gut reaction, "I believed your brother well-guarded. I had no advance warning of the attack, no notion that Fulcrum would attack in force. Believe me, I hate the news almost as much as you." His monotone broke as he said the final words, although Ellie doubted the reason for his hatred of the news was anything like her own.
"Can I see his body?" Ellie managed to ask, wiping at her eyes and her mouth. Trust no one.
Graham stiffened but tried to hide the reaction. "No. I'm afraid he is buried under tons of rubble. His body may never be found. There were no survivors He is dead." Graham's voice and his body language seemed to express genuine regret.
Ellie made herself take a breath, and calculate before she asked another question. She feigned stupor as if she were too shell-shocked to know what question came next.
"What about the woman he works with? He came to DC with her. Sarah Walker."
Graham's face remained impassive although his eyes betrayed an interest in the question. "She's dead too, I'm afraid."
Ellie wasn't sure she believed Graham, but even so, the words were another twist of the dagger already deep in her heart, the leprous hand in her bowels.
She did her best to play dumb; it wasn't hard; there was so much she did not know, did not understand. "What were Chuck and Sarah Walker doing in a CIA facility? They work in Burbank, at Appocalypse…" The name seemed suddenly an ill-omen, "...they design apps, you know, like for phones. They're harmless. Nerds. Computer drudges. At least, my brother is. Sarah's harder to explain."
Graham nodded as if in sympathy although Ellie doubted sympathy was in the man's emotional repertoire. "I wish I could explain all of this to you, but I can't. Not yet. But here's what I can tell you. Your brother worked for me, voluntarily. Sarah Walker was a CIA agent for years, one of my best, no, my very best, and she was assigned to work with your brother and protect him. That's what she was sent to LA to do and what she did. They came back to DC to be debriefed, together; that's why they were at the facility."
Ellie thought about Sarah's file.
Graham was lying. That was not why Sarah was sent to LA. Ellie had seen Graham's orders in Sarah's file. Perhaps that's how things worked out later; but Ellie knew the truth about those first days of Sarah's time with Chuck. Killing time.
Ellie couldn't trust herself to say anything in response, so she let her tears fall, her fear for Chuck and herself — and a little for Sarah — more than real enough to draw more water from her eyes. Her stomach churned but she did not vomit again.
"I'll give you some time. A doctor will be in soon, to tend to you, and then you will be moved to more comfortable quarters. I've brought you here for your safety, Ellie. The people who killed your brother are frightening and chaotic. They've declared war on the US government, starting with US intelligence, the CIA. And, with you here, out of view, your fiancé should also be safe."
"Devon! I need to talk to him, please!" Ellie begged, thoughts of Devon returning with immediate urgency through the drugs and fear and grief. "He'll be terrified, crazy."
"No," Graham countered, shaking his head, holding out a placatory hand, "Don't worry. I've dispatched agents to talk to him, tell him as much as possible, and keep him from worrying. You will talk to him soon. Later today, likely. Rest now. The doctor will be in and the drug should be cleared from your system shortly."
Ellie made herself nod as if she believed him. Graham pulled on the bottom of his vest, as if unwrinkling his suit and his soul, buttoned his jacket, and left her seated alone in the room.
Still blinking in the light, Ellie scanned the room. Other than her chair, the room was bare, except for the wall to her right, which seemed mostly covered by a large mirror. She stared at herself. She looked like a hostage — or like she had often looked during her residency, frantic and exhausted.
She wiped her eyes again and tried to think. What's happening? What the hell is happening?
She refused to believe Chuck was dead, but Graham's manner suggested that something had happened. Something serious. Was it Sarah? Had something happened to her? Ellie tried to focus her mind.
A man wearing a white coat entered the room. He was carrying a small tray. He smiled at her, medical school bedside manners.
"Dr. Bartowski, hello. I'd like to examine you for a minute, and then administer a counteragent to the tranquilizer. It will clear your head."
Graham stood in the next room, on the other side of the two-way mirror. He watched as Ellie wiped her eyes.
He still had heard nothing from Agent Walker. Her phone seemed no longer to be working.
Nothing seemed to be working.
Except he had the sister. He glanced at her again. The CIA doctor had entered the room. Graham wasn't sure Ellie would prove useful, but he had begun to believe that Bartowskis were rarely what they seemed.
Underestimating them is a bad idea.
Graham had thought about claiming Chuck was alive and using him against Ellie, as leverage, but decided against it. His first hope was to try to convince her that she could help him fight Fulcrum, that she could aid in avenging her brother's death. Better to have her working willingly, and motivated, than to twist her arm, and leverage her. Graham hoped he had planted enough of a seed. Later, he would water it, and fertilize it.
And if that failed, he could always use Ellie's fiancé against her. He would have his way in the end.
He took out his phone and called one of his trusted analysts. "Any communication of any kind from Walker? Any sign of her?"
"No, sir," the woman replied, "but DC police have put out an ABP on a male suspect in a hotel beating. The man sounds like Bryce Larkin."
Graham stiffened.
Astley went back to the room Bryce had assigned her and found her clothes, freshly washed, on her bed. She took off her hospital gown and slippers and put on the clothes, and her street shoes. Someone had hung a lab coat in the closet, the door opened so she would see it.
Good of Bryce to take care of me.
She put on the lab coat and walked back into the hallway. She had three things she needed to do.
First, she used Bryce's phone to call Bob, even though he was only in another part of the building.
When he answered, uncertain, she gave him an order. "Graham and the CIA have Bartowski's sister, Ellie. Contact our double agents in Langley. I want to know where she is before nightfall."
"Okay, Astley," Bob said with only mild reluctance.
"Dr. Astley," she replied. "Make sure they understand the order came from me. Bryce is not doing well. I fear he may not make it."
"Right, Dr. Astley."
She hung up and smiled to herself.
Using Bob to cement her position was the smart play. Kudos to me. Everyone had seen how close Bob was to Bryce. If Bob accepted her leadership, everyone else would fall in line — or enough would. She could take care of any dissenters later. And it was a good time to do it, with Bryce known to be in serious condition by most, and seen in that condition by many. Everything and everyone was still confused and destabilized after the raid on the Intersect Lab, the heavy commitment of agents, and the scattering of resources, and all made worse by Bryce's hell-bent efforts to find Bartowski, and then by Larkin's attacking one of Fulcrum's own men.
Second, she went to Bryce's personal room. As she expected, his phone vibrated, she put in his password, and the door's room unlocked. She would search the room later but for now, she needed only one item. Bryce's iPad. She had seen his reliance on it after the raid of the Intersect Lab. Predictably, the same password that worked on his phone worked on it. A moment later, she was thumbing through all of his secrets, the secrets of Fulcrum. She did not spend any time actually reading the documents or watching Bryce's daily logs; there would be time for that later too.
She left Bryce's room and retraced her steps to the medical room again. After checking the hallway, she went inside.
Bryce was still unconscious on the stretcher.
This was the third thing.
A closet on the other side of the room revealed extra bed things when she opened it. She reached in and grabbed a pillow.
She walked to Bryce's bedside and put the pillow over his face and tightly held it down. His hands came up in a feeble, clawing attempt to free himself, to secure air, but he was too weak to break her grip. And then his body arced and trembled and collapsed back onto the bed.
She took the pillow back to the closet, fluffed it a little, and, humming tunelessly to herself, put it away.
Dr. Astley was now running Fulcrum. Amazing what happens when talent meets opportunity. She had originally thought she would keep Bryce alive and study his Intersect, but the more she thought about it, the less wise that plan seemed. Keeping Bryce alive was keeping a serpent at her bosom. Better to end him. She'd take the Intersect from Bartowski. And anyway, it was clear to her now that Bryce's was broken, defective.
She closed the closet door and glanced at Bryce's corpse. No doubt Bryce expected to die, if he died, with a bang and not a whimper.
As it was, he didn't even manage a whimper.
Astley smiled again, and coughed. Fulcrum would steal Ellie Bartowski from Langston Graham, and then Astley would not have to hunt for Bartowski.
Bartowski will crawl to me.
Chuck sat on the bed, hearing without attending to Sarah's shower. He wanted to join her but he was too spent to manage it.
His mind was racing. He was not sure he should have revealed to Stanfield that Graham's blackmail files were in the Intersect.
And, making the racing worse, he was not sure why they were in it. He had discovered them early on when working at Appocalypse, but he had said nothing about them, unsure what to make of their existence at all. He had tried to keep the files out of his mind, but TV news or the radio or newspapers often brought one or another to his mind. The Intersect had taught Chuck that knowledge was not an unqualified good. It was better not to know some things. For no one to know them but the principals. It was as if someone had opened Chuck's mind and dumped the worst sort of gossip into it, dumped it in a greasy mass.
Why had Graham never mentioned the files or alluded to them?
Chuck was beginning to suspect that the Intersect he carried in his head and the Intersect Graham thought Chuck carried were not identical. But how could they be distinct? How could Chuck have any Intersect other than the one created at the Intersect Lab, the one that Graham thought he had?
Green Lantern. The suspicion was irresistible. Green Lantern had insinuated himself into the Intersect story — and so Chuck's story — again and again. Was it possible that the Intersect Chuck paired with, the one he carried, was not Graham's Intersect? Maybe the things he allowed Chuck to do, things again that Graham had never mentioned, alluded to, maybe those things were part of a different Intersect.
Maybe Chuck's destiny was being steered by a star beyond Graham's reckoning.
Maybe my father's been watching over me all this time? Maybe this Intersect is my birthright?
For the first time since he had paired with the Intersect, the Intersect stopped feeling like a curse and started to feel like a promise, perhaps, even — a blessing.
Chuck stretched out on the bed, intending only to close his eyes for a moment, to contemplate this new, hopeful thought, but he went to sleep as soon as his eyes closed.
Carina told Tyger her prepared backstory. She knew enough from long years in deep cover to keep it lean, not to overshare, and provide too many details. Details were the unpracticed liar's supposed secret weapon but they were actually a tell.
Listen to most people tell stories — they may go on tangents, but they don't provide details unless asked. Stories have a point, and details only have a place when they help to secure the point. Otherwise, they're just meaningless accretions, a crust of barnacles on the hull of the story, slowing it down.
So Carina said only what she needed to say, had planned to say, and left it at that. Tyger, obviously a man who knew how to detect liars, asked nothing, said nothing. He moved only to sip his coffee. He waited to see if Carina would entangle herself in her own tale.
When she finished, he nodded at her once and then finished his coffee in one gulp.
"You understand the sort of place you are in, don't you?"
Carina was unsure exactly what he was asking, and she intentionally allowed some of the very real fear she felt to make its way up from her stomach to her eyes. "I know this is a dangerous place. I know that my fate here turns on you."
"Women are normally forbidden here. The only ones who visit are ones that we…pay to visit."
Carina nodded once; she understood what Tyger meant.
"The only way you can stay here…safely…is if you are my woman. No pretense. It would not last. I have to be here for another few days, and then I will leave. You can leave with me, if…" He let the rest trail off, expecting her to understand without him saying it.
At least he's asking, sort of. Although he's really not giving me any choice. But he believes my story for now. He wants me as willing as he can get me.
"Your woman — with all that entails?" she asked carefully. He did not answer, he just stared at her.
"Starting…now?"
His black eyes were heated and bottomless. "Now."
She stood up, determined to get out of the camp alive, to get back to Casey, although she might have to pay a price that would cause Casey to reject her. Her spirit shrank inside her. "I'm ready."
Tyger stood up and put out his hand. She took it.
For the first time in her life, Carina wanted to weep for herself.
Sarah found Chuck asleep on the bed. She found a blanket in the closet and, after stretching out beside him, she threw it over them both.
The irony struck her. A cover she wanted at last.
Casey stood looking out the window of his room in Stanfield's house.
He liked the General, despite his taste in paintings.
Casey put his hand to the window and took it back, looking at the hand-shaped imprint his warmth had created on the cold glass.
He thought of Carina but shook the thought from his head. He had enough on his plate and he was sure she did too. Later.
God, I wish I could call her. Or she could call me.
He shook his head again.
It was time for him and the kid and Sarah to figure out how to fight their way out of the jam they were in. They had the General on their side.
And Green Lantern. A joker in the deck, but one that might turn up in their favor.
He turned from his window and undressed and got into bed, praying for no dreams.
A/N: We are three-quarters of the way through this long arc, Hopes and Fears. Lines begin to intersect (no pun intended) next time. Difficult decisions are made.
