Thanks again to MySoapBox who is doing proofreading/editing chores in the absence of my regular editor, Poa, who is on her way back onto the grid (kind of like Papa Bartowski). Welcome back Poa!
I got some great suggestions from MSB, which are incorporated herein. I think you'll like the changes, MSB. I hope I captured what you were looking for.
Sorry about leaving you with Sarah inside a blown up building…wait… no I'm not. It's what I do. Call me 'Mr. Cliffhanger.'
And now the next exciting installment of…
CHUCK VERSUS THE BUY MORE BOMBER
Chapter 9
Agent Down
Chuck staggered as if punched, even though the force from the explosion was a mere puff of wind by the time it reached him. Chuck felt an icy hand, a giant's hand, clutch his heart and squeeze. He had to force himself to breathe and even then his breath came in a ragged gasp. Time seemed to stop. He willed his feet forward, but for a moment that seemed to stretch to eternity, he was frozen in place. The image before him would be burned in his mind forever. Oily black smoke rose in a giant plume from the back of the store while a cloud of dust, debris and smoke, flashing with hints of orange flame, billowed from the shattered front doors. The people in front of the store – the lucky ones who got out – struggled to their feet. They turned, looked in horror at the hell behind them and ran if they could, stumbled or hobbled or even crawled if they couldn't, to escape the burning wreckage which had once been the place they worked, laughed, and griped about their dead end jobs. One woman sat on the ground, her bloody hands covering her face as she screamed something unintelligible.
"Sarah," Chuck said in a voice as soft as an exhale. His face was a mask of pain and confusion. Something stronger than fear took hold of him. He started toward the store, forgetting that Casey still had a grip on his arm. The tug on his arm brought him up short and he turned to look at Casey. Chuck had seen Casey mad, tired, bored, disappointed and even in love (or at least, a reasonable facsimile with Ilsa), but he had never seen Casey stricken with fear and dread. He wasn't even looking at Chuck. His eyes were riveted on the store.
Half dazed, half angry, Chuck jerked his arm away and started forward again. Casey blinked and seemed to recover. "No, Chuck," he said, his voice hoarse as he reached out and grabbed Chuck's arm again.
"Casey, it's Sarah," Chuck pleaded. Casey turned his face away. The fear disappeared from Chuck's eyes, and his face took on a terrible countenance. His brown eyes were as hard as obsidian. Almost involuntarily, his hand clenched into a fist and his eyes began to burn with a manic fire brighter than those that began to lick at the entrance to the store. Casey, composing himself, started to turn back to say something to Chuck. He never got the chance.
Chuck's fist collided with the side of Casey's jaw with a sound as sharp as the crack of a rifle. Casey's head jerked to the side, his eyes losing focus for a moment. He staggered a half-step back under the unexpected blow and he lost his grip on Chuck's arm.
Casey shook his head to clear it and blinked rapidly. Reflexively, his hands flew to the 'ready' position and he assumed a fighting stance. But there was no one to fight. He looked about in confusion only to see Chuck halfway to the entrance to the store, moving faster than Casey would have thought possible for the lanky nerd.
Casey recovered quickly and broke into a dead run. "Chuck! Dammit Bartowski, don't be a hero," he yelled. Chuck either ignored him or didn't hear him; his arms and legs wind-milling as he ran flat-out for the entrance of the now burning Buy More, the FBI windbreaker flapping behind him like a cape.
A man in a tattered green shirt teetered perilously on shaky legs as he struggled out of the entrance to the store. Chuck nearly bowled him over, pushing him out of the way in his quest for the entrance. A second smaller explosion blew Chuck backwards with blistering heat and spraying debris. Undaunted, he pulled his jacket up around his face and pressed forward. The roar of the flames was so loud Chuck couldn't hear Casey behind him, yelling at him to stop, cursing Chuck's foolish bravado.
Chuck didn't feel brave. He didn't feel fear. If anything, he felt an odd mixture of rage and despair as he pushed aside the twisted remains of a display rack in order to gain entrance to the store, like Orpheus descending into Hell to rescue his Eurydice. The interior of the store was ablaze and thick black smoke billowed from the back of the store, the apparent epicenter of the blast. A cardboard standee of a smiling Green Shirt stood upright, wedged in the debris just inside the entrance, but it was now crowned with a halo of fire. Chuck coughed. The heat was so intense it felt as if his eyes would boil out of their sockets. He raised his arm to shield them and the tender flesh of his face as he staggered forward, dodging bits of flaming ceiling tile.
He practically tripped over the body of a man in a Nerd Herd uniform, lying just inside the entrance, his legs splayed at an impossible angle. Chuck recoiled for an instant; no matter how much death he had seen since he received the Intersect, the sight of a body hit him like a jab to the gut. How much worse when the body was dressed in his own uniform? He shook it off and struggled forward, trying to put the sight out of his mind.
A man suddenly appeared out of the smoke, half his face burned away. Chuck recoiled again, but recovered enough to grab the man and shove him toward the store's entrance. He felt a twinge of guilt for not assisting the man further, but all he could think of was Sarah. An image of her, her face blacked and blistered filled his mind. "No!" he cried and tried to force the image from his mind. All he had found so far was death and injury. Despair threatened to tear his heart from his chest, but still he struggled forward.
"Sarah!" he screamed. No response. He tried to call her name again, but instead inhaled a searing lungful of smoke. He coughed, staggered forward and coughed again. He peeked under the protection of his arm to survey the store. The back of the store was completely wrecked. If Sarah had been there… No! He refused to even consider the possibility. He squinted in the heat, looking for some clue. "Sarah!" he coughed. She was a trained agent; she would have taken cover from the blast. He could feel his hair begin to curl as it was singed by the heat. He turned to the right. The Customer Service Counter!
He practically leapt at the counter. He grabbed a metal display rack blocking his way, his flesh searing on the hot metal. He didn't even notice. With a bellow of rage and adrenaline, he pushed the heavy rack aside and staggered up to the counter to peer over.
There was a body lying prone behind the counter. Catching sight of the tattered remains of yellow lettering on the back of the figure's windbreaker he gasped, "Sarah;" but then he saw that the body was too big for Sarah. Then he caught the hint of a woman's hand protruding from underneath the body. With a strangled cry, more animal than human, he vaulted the counter.
"Bartowski!" came a call from behind him. The angry voice of John Casey. It didn't even register to him as speech, only one more sound in the cacophony that filled the store. Recognizing the first body now as Ari, he grabbed the Mossad agent and pushed him roughly to the side. Ari groaned. Beneath him was the still form of Sarah Walker. All thought but her safety driven from his mind, Chuck was pure action. He scooped Sarah up in his arms and scrambled over the counter.
"Bartowski!"
Casey was suddenly in front of him. Chuck blinked dumbly at the larger man and then tried to elbow him aside. When Casey didn't move but reached out for Sarah, Chuck flinched and seemed to blink at surprise at seeing Casey there. "Ari's back there," he shouted over the roar of the flames, jerking his head back towards the counter to show Casey where the other agent was. He staggered past Casey, through the smoke, and out of the store. His breath was coming in ragged gasps now as he coughed to try and clear the smoke from his lungs. A set of hands reached for him, reached for Sarah. He yanked violently away and staggered forward, toward safety.
Another set of hands grabbed him. "Agent. Agent it's okay. You got her out. You're safe." Chuck whirled to confront the voice, clinging desperately to Sarah. He had to protect her. He had to… had to… He blinked. A police officer stood in front of him, hand on his shoulder. "Come on, Agent. Let's set her down. The paramedics are on the way."
Chuck blinked again. His eyes burned from the smoke and the tears and the heat and the sunlight. He looked down at the woman in his arms, at Sarah. At the woman who meant more to him than his very life. What more proof of that did he need? The officer guided him to a spot of grass and he gently laid Sarah down. "Is she?" was all he managed to say.
Suddenly, Sarah's body convulsed in a fit of coughing and Chuck took her in his arms and tried to hold her while she gasped for air.
"Over here!" he heard the policeman shout and he looked up to see a large shape ambling toward him out of the smoke. He blinked several times trying to clear his vision, still grasping tightly to Sarah. The shape resolved itself into John Casey, the still form of Ari Schwartz slung across his shoulder in a fireman's carry. Casey gently eased Ari to the ground next to Sarah, careful to place him on his stomach as his back was lacerated, blood soaking into the remains of his shirt and FBI windbreaker.
Sirens began to wail as police cars, fire trucks and ambulances pulled into the parking lot, followed by the 'whump, whump, whump' of the helicopters. Casey coughed and glared up at the policeman who was standing over them. "Keep everyone except the paramedics away from these three. You understand. Keep everyone else away. Get me a goddam paramedic right now!"
Casey struggled to his feet and glared down at Chuck. "Don't think this is over, Bartowski," he coughed. Chuck stared dumbly up at him. Casey turned his back and Chuck heard him mutter, "You brave, stupid, heroic, idiotic son of a…"
His last words were cut off by Sarah's coughing. She gasped for breath and Chuck's heart nearly burst from his chest when she opened her eyes to blink up at him. Her eyes seemed unfocused and she squinted at him. "Chuck?" she gasped, "Chuck is that…"
"Shhh, Sarah. It's me. You're safe," Chuck croaked. He stroked her blonde hair and tears streamed down his cheeks, making tracks in the soot and grime.
Sarah coughed again. "Ari?" she asked.
"He's right here. Casey got him out," Chuck rasped, his voice raw from the smoke.
"He saved my life," Sarah gasped.
Chuck's tears were streaming freely now. "Then I owe him mine," he said softly.
There was a sudden commotion as Casey hauled two paramedics over and dropped one in front of Ari and one in front of Sarah. The paramedics gave Casey one last frightened look, then got to work. "Sir," the one said to Chuck. "Sir, let me have a look at her." Chuck reluctantly released her and the paramedic started to examine her. Chuck started to move away, but Sarah grabbed his hand. Chuck winced – he hadn't even noticed his hands were burned until now – but he didn't let go. As long as Sarah wanted him, he would stay right here. He gratefully sank back to the ground and held her hand. Two more paramedics came over carrying oxygen bottles. They strapped masks on Chuck and Sarah and turned on the flow. The cool oxygen felt good on Chuck's raw throat. He pulled the mask aside, coughed again, and put the mask back in place.
One of the paramedics handed a bottle to Casey and he reluctantly accepted it, putting the mask over his face. A couple minutes later, a third group of paramedics trooped up. The leader of the new group gave Casey a slight nod, which Casey returned. "We'll take it from here," the new paramedic said.
The other paramedics looked confused but packed up their things to go tend to other victims. One of the new paramedics knelt by Sarah. "Agent Walker, I'm agent Humbolt, CIA. Are you all right?"
Sarah nodded without removing her mask. Agent Humbolt checked her over. When he finished, he turned to Chuck. "I'm fine," Chuck protested after pulling the mask from his face. "See to her."
"Please, Agent Carmichael, let me be the judge of that." Agent Humbolt began checking him over and Chuck winced when the man touched his hands. "You've got a pretty good burn, there," the man said. He looked around and then said to Chuck in a low voice, "Everyone around here is talking about how you clocked Agent Casey and then ran into the fire to save Agent Walker. You're going to be the talk of the agency."
Sarah's eyes went wide. It was obvious she had overheard the conversation. She struggled to sit up but Humbolt turned to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Lie down, Agent Walker. It doesn't look like you have a concussion, but we're going to check you over very carefully once I take care of Agent Carmichael's burns."
Sarah lay back down but fixed her eyes on Chuck. There was a flicker of irritation at first, but then her visage softened. She tried to be angry at him for what he had done. How many times had she told him that his life was the more valuable? That it was her job to protect him? But how could you be mad at the man who just saved your life?
Chuck suddenly felt very self-conscious. "You know," he whispered to the paramedic. "I'd appreciate it if you guys didn't go spreading this story around. You, ah, know how Agent Casey can get."
Agent Humbolt nodded. "Gotcha," he said. "Mum's the word. I'll let the guys know."
"Thanks," Chuck replied as Agent Humbolt began to slather some kind of salve on his hands and then wrap them in gauze. Chuck looked down as he did and noticed for the first time that the nylon sleeves of his windbreaker had actually puckered and bubbled slightly from the heat.
"You're going to want to put some aloe on your face, too," the agency paramedic said. "I'll go get some."
A voice, raspy yet booming at the same time, sounded from the cluster of police vehicles a short distance away. "Agent Casey!" it called. "Casey, dammit, where are you?"
Casey glanced up to see a woman in a cheap suit and bottle-blonde hair striding toward him. "Oh crap," he moaned when he recognized Captain Barbara Anders, LAPD.
Anders strode up and put her hands on her hips. "Well, you certainly made a mess of yourself, didn't you cupcake?"
Casey winced and Chuck couldn't help smiling. He looked back down at Sarah, but she didn't seem to have heard or even noticed Anders. She was staring at Chuck with a look so intense that Chuck involuntarily shuddered. Sarah's eyes were watering but Chuck wrote that off to the smoke. "Are you all right?" she asked, her voice barely a whisper. "Do your hands hurt? You… You…" She coughed so hard she had to readjust her mask. Tears were streaming down her face now. "Chuck," she said, struggling up to her elbow so that she could lay a hand on his arm. "You could have been hurt. You could have been killed." There was no anger in her voice, but rather a note almost of pleading.
"I'm all right," he assured her. "I…" He was interrupted by Agent Humbolt returning. The agency paramedic began to slather a gel on Chuck's face. He closed his eyes and reveled in the coolness of the salve, but he could still feel Sarah's hand on his arm.
"We're going to take you both over to County General to get you checked out," Agent Humbolt said. "Right after we get Agent Schwartz out of here." Chuck glanced over. Two other paramedics loaded Ari onto a gurney and put him in the back of an ambulance. Chuck started to protest that he didn't need a hospital, but then glanced down at Sarah. If he refused, she no doubt would as well and he wanted to make sure she was going to be okay.
Sarah laid back and closed her eyes, but kept her grip on Chuck's arm. As the adrenaline ebbed away, Chuck suddenly felt as if every limb was made of lead. He slipped to the grass next to her and took her hand. He could feel the light pressure of her hand in his; but though he ached to feel her, feel her flesh pressed to his, he had to settle for a light squeeze from her through the gauze. The simple gesture caused a twinge of pain to his burned hand, but he squeezed her hand back even tighter.
