Hello. I'm trying my best to cut down the time between chapters, but I don't seem to be having much success. I've got a lot of things going on right now, and I wish one of them was a full-time job. I have to keep working at that. And the funniest part is, this chapter follows canon a bit more than most chapters. Although there is some background information to read in this chapter, some foreshadowing, and a long conversation that will play a role later in the story.
BTW, if you catch any meta-references, just let me know. Somehow I managed to slip a few past you in the last chapter, and I don't just mean all the Chevy Chase quotes. Ted Roark's mansion is one of them...that is if you think sharing your house with Tony Stark could be considered a meta-reference. And now that I think about it, I used Chevy's actual address for the scene where Chuck has to be rescued.
I have also tried to add humor to my stories. Let me know if it's working and if you have any particular favorites from the story. Writers ALWAYS want to know what you think. At least I do. :-)
Anyway, enjoy the new chapter, which contains plenty of material that is the property of NBC and Fake Empire productions. And don't forget to review! Hopefully everybody's getting excited for what happens next.
La Belle Équipe Café – Paris, France
April 5, 2016
9:30 PM CEST
He looked as the crowds began to thin out. The people weren't as boisterous as they used to be. It was understandable: Paris had been attacked twice in the last year, and nineteen people were murdered on this very street only five months ago. He wasn't around to see it happen, not that it would have mattered anyway. He already knew what senseless loss felt like.
His wife was murdered thirteen years ago.
This was where he proposed to her, and they were married in a beautiful cathedral not far away exactly one year later. It was a lovely spring day just like this one. He originally met her on the quad at the University of Iowa. She walked by, hurrying to her next class, while he was taking in a brisk Friday afternoon right before Wisconsin was due into Kinnick Stadium for a football game the next day. He watched her go by, and she turned back and smiled.
That smile was all he needed to know about her. Even after she showed up the following Monday to the very same CIA orientation class he did.
They had what Minnie Driver once described in Grosse Pointe Blank as "frightening natural chemistry." He was stoic and guarded; she was flirty and playful. And it worked. After graduating from Iowa, both of them started on covert operations for the government. Most times they worked alone, but every now and again they worked together posing as a married couple. One of those times was right here. They were taking a break, and he couldn't think of a more romantic place to propose. He never thought he would be happier in his life.
He became a widower after two years of marriage when she was killed on a mission.
He was beyond devastated. He was never the same agent after that. They tried to keep him in the field for a few years following her death, but it was to no avail. They then transferred him to Langley to analyze intel from agents, but he didn't have the skills…or the heart…for the job. Eventually he was let go on a medical hardship so he could at least collect a salary. It was at that point he fell off the face of the Earth. Nobody had seen or heard from him since, although nobody really put in much of an effort to do so.
As he poured another drink from the bottle he bought, he felt the rage that had been a part of him since the day he found out his wife had died. It was a rage that had consumed him because it had no outlet. It had no path in which it could be directed. He wanted justice. No…he wanted revenge.
The only thing he wanted out of the rest of his life was to find the person who killed Evelyn.
National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA) – Urbana, IL
September 17, 1992
2:30 PM CDT
"This isn't right. We are not ready."
Stephen Bartowski couldn't believe it. For supposedly being the leader of this team, he had little pull with the government. They fast-tracked Project Goodwin over his protests. He had successfully translated the data the NSA provided into images, but a lot more testing needed to be done. However, Major Langston Graham didn't appear to have much interest in anything he had to say outside of beginning the tests.
"You told me the images are ready," Graham replied in an extremely gruff tone.
"But we need more time to test this. We don't want another Agent X on our hands. That blew up in the government's face twelve years ago."
"This needs to work and work now. After what happened in the Middle East, in Kuwait, and with the downfall of the Soviet Union, the political stability of the world is very fluid right now. We have to be proactive. We can't afford to sit on our asses anymore and hope it all works out."
"But we're skipping protocols and going right to a live test. Those protocols are there for a reason."
"Wouldn't be the first time," Graham replied without a single ounce of sympathy.
"But why him?" Stephen demanded. "This could be potentially dangerous to the students if it fails, and you said the first student would be chosen at random from the entire group. Why Jimmy? What did he do wrong?"
"Did you read his file? Mother and sister died when he was eight? Killed by a drunk driver, who also happened to be his abusive father? Never had any friends, never dated any girls, slept in his car after running away from home? We couldn't get a better candidate. Let this thing kill him; we'd be doing him a favor."
"No, absolutely not. I will not be a party to destroying his life. The Intersect program is not ready for human testing."
"That is disappointing, Mr. Bartowski," Graham said in an extremely ominous tone. "Are you refusing to cooperate? Because I would hate for anything happen to your family. Your wife, Mary. Your children, Eleanor and Chuck."
Stephen looked ready to kill Graham. But this was all he had left in his life. Ted Roark had managed to steal so many of the things he invented and was building an empire off of them. This project was all he had. And he had to see it through to keep his family protected.
"Fine, you win," he said in defeat. "But I walk away when this is done. And you never come near my family."
"That seems reasonable," Graham replied with a shrug.
"Yeah, blackmail always seems reasonable to the person exercising it," Stephen hissed.
Graham picked up a phone. "Bring him in."
An assistant led Jimmy Slade into a large room in the basement of the NCSA. Apart from a one-way mirror along one wall and a projector screen at the opposite end, the only item in the entire room was a very uncomfortable chair with wrist and ankle straps. The assistant pointed to it, indicating for Jimmy to sit down. She then placed the restraints around his wrists and ankles, giving him the same derisive look almost every other person at the University of Illinois gave him. Jimmy thought he had left that behind when he finished high school. But he could not have been more wrong.
The assistant walked out of the room and the lights dimmed. "You will see a series of images on the projector screen in front of you," a voice called out over the loudspeakers. "Keep your eyes focused on the images."
Jimmy nodded his assent. The first image appeared on the screen. Jimmy thought nothing of the field of mushrooms he was seeing. The image then changed to a baseball field, then kids playing in a park, then a picture of the Lincoln Memorial, then a gondola floating along a river…
The images started to flicker by. From one every five seconds to every second to two per second, the pace quickening at an exponential rate. Jimmy was starting to feel quite the headache. He tried to close his eyes but couldn't. He couldn't turn his head to the side. He couldn't even blink. The images had a hypnotic effect on him.
The pain started to become unbearable. He started growling in pain, attempting to get out of the chair but held back by the restraints. The pain increased, causing him to scream louder and louder. The images continued to change at a blinding pace.
He then collapsed in the chair. Stephen gasped from behind the one-way mirror and immediately shut the projector off. He ran out into the room and removed the restraints on Jimmy.
"Someone call 911!" he shouted.
"No!" Graham bellowed. "Do not call anybody!"
Stephen looked at him in horror. "Are you insane? His pulse is barely there and his breathing is labored! I warned you this could happen! The technology required to make the Intersect work doesn't even exist yet!"
"Nobody can know about his experiment, Mr. Bartowski. Send the other nine students back to the dormitory. We have to find some way to salvage this."
"And what about Jimmy?" Stephen demanded.
Graham walked back to the room behind the one-way mirror and made a call to the NSA office in Chicago to order backup and a medical team.
"What about him?" Graham said with a shrug.
Stephen stared at Graham in absolute disbelief. He couldn't believe he could be this callous about someone who may have just lost his life. Someone who didn't deserve it. He couldn't be a part of this anymore. There was no way he would allow anybody else to end up with the same fate as Jimmy. But Graham's threat regarding his family echoed in his mind. He realized he had two choices to protect his family: continue with Project Goodwin and risk another innocent person or disappear forever. Neither option sounded appealing.
He began to plan his escape.
Unknown Location
April 10, 2016
8:00 PM PDT
Chuck and Sarah watched his father walk around the trailer…as much as he could walk in such a confined space…trying to make some coffee for them.
"I'm sort of freaking out here," he whispered to Sarah.
"I know," she replied. "But he's your father, and he seemed happy to see you."
"You think? I thought it was just lack of recognition followed by shock."
"You take cream?"
"Huh?" Chuck turned towards his father. "Yeah. No. Whatever's fine." He turned to Sarah again. "I can't even remember if I take cream," he quietly huffed.
"Just relax," Sarah replied, putting a reassuring hand on his arm.
"How? I…I haven't…I haven't seen my dad for, like, ten years, and now I'm sitting in his living room-slash-kitchenette while he's making us coffee. Plus, let's just say the last time I saw him, he was kind of…I mean, he tended to be a little…what's the word? Crazy."
"Here we go," Stephen said, handing coffee mugs to Chuck and Sarah. He smiled. "So good to see that face again. And dating…well, Sarah. I can't believe you found him. You could have your pick of any guy in the world and you're dating my son."
Chuck gave a little laugh. "It's good to see you, too. So, uh, you doing OK?"
"Who cares about me?" Stephen said broadly, although it was obvious he was trying to get the spotlight away from himself. "Tell me what's going on with you. I mean, you must be quite happy these days, hanging out with the cast, dating Sarah."
"That's…there's not much to tell outside of that," Chuck carefully replied. "Graduated high school, went to Stanford. Was working at a Buy More before meeting Sarah and started working on her show."
"Stanford. Not bad." Stephen appeared to give a more genuine smile at that thought, the same one he gave anytime he looked back and forth between Chuck and Sarah. "He was always the genius, this one," he told her.
"No, not like you," Chuck replied quietly.
"You're right. He was smarter." That put a smile on Sarah's face. "What about Ellie? How is she?"
"Really great, actually. She's a doctor now, and in a few weeks, she's going to get married to…well, an awesome guy."
"Ellie's getting married?"
"She is. That's actually, mainly why we're here. "Ellie was really hoping that you might be there to walk her down the aisle."
Stephen shifted uncomfortably. "I don't think she would want me there."
"I mean, of course…of course she does. We both do."
"It's not a good idea," Stephen replied with a bit of force behind it as he poured himself another cup of coffee. "But tell her that I'm happy for her."
Chuck stood. "Are-are you joking? You have to do this. She's your daughter. Don't you want to be there?"
"Charles, I can't…"
"I don't want to hear what you can't do," Chuck retorted in anger. "I've SEEN what you can't do."
Stephen's posture slumped in shame. Sarah looked back and forth between the two.
"I'm sorry," Chuck said, dropping back down into his chair. "I…uh…that came out wrong."
Stephen shook his head. "No it didn't. You're mad. I left, and…and you're mad."
"Look, Dad, I'm not even here for me really, OK? Right now, I just…I want you to come home for Ellie. Please."
"I like you coming up here and fighting for Ellie. Makes me happy you at least had each other."
He rose and went towards his bed at the opposite end of the trailer. "Let me get a few things together."
"Are you OK?' Sarah asked Chuck.
"Yeah, I think so. I mean, I'm glad we found him for Ellie."
"And for you?"
Chuck sat there for a moment before nodding. "Yeah. Maybe he's not as crazy as I remembered."
"OK," Stephen said as he joined them with a bag and a series of folders. "Let's get your sister married." He then looked out the window. "Good, it's dark enough now. They're tracking my every move. Rat bastards."
"Forget I just said that," he whispered to Sarah.
Echo Park – Los Angeles, CA
April 10, 2016
9:30 PM PDT
"So, I was thinking that this would be perfect for the rehearsal dinner," Ellie said to Devon, holding up one of his ties. "Because if I wear that sage dress, this will match perfectly."
"Sounds good," Devon replied.
"Or…"
The door opened. "Hey, Ellie."
"Hey, Chuck. Just a sec." She turned back to Devon. "Or we could do the cranberry, which would really bring out your…um…"
Ellie stopped and looked back at the door. She couldn't move.
"Hello, Eleanor," Stephen said with a smile.
The two stared at each other. "Aren't you going to say something?" Chuck asked her.
"Pancakes?" she eked out.
"Oh, boy," Stephen replied, completely crestfallen.
"You said you were gonna make pancakes," she said as tears came to her eyes.
"I…I…"
Ellie ran off to her bedroom. Chuck followed her to it. Stephen and Devon stood there awkwardly.
"That…that went well," Stephen said quietly.
Chuck knocked on Ellie's bedroom. "El, I'm sorry." He opened the door slowly to find Ellie lying on her bed. Chuck sat down next to her. "I'm sorry, I should have called first. A surprise of this magnitude wasn't the best idea."
"It's not your fault," she replied. "I'm just…so mad at him, our crazy old dad. Aren't you mad at him?"
Chuck exhaled slowly. "I was, yeah. But then I realized that…you know, we can hate him for the rest of our lives, or we can choose to forgive him."
"It's easier to hate him."
"Well that may be. But he's all we got left, El. This could be our last chance at being a family again."
Ellie turned towards Chuck. A tiny smile graced her lips and she put her hand on Chuck's arm. "Let's go," she said.
The two of them walked back into the living room to find Stephen and Devon talking to one another. They stopped when Ellie sat down on the couch next to Devon.
"I…" Ellie began. "I was just surprised to see you, Dad."
"Yeah," Stephen replied with a chuckle. "I'm sure you were. You…you look just like your mother."
The already-high tension in the room didn't seem to be abating. "What…were you two discussing?" Chuck asked carefully.
"Actually, your father was just explaining our television to me," Devon replied.
"Yeah, I was just telling Devon that I, um, invented your TV," Stephen said, digging into his pockets for some drawings he did on a small piece of paper. "I came up with these helix-shaped plasma crystals back in high school. Never saw a dime for it. Touchscreen technology, that was one of mine. Uh, Ted Roark and I came up with it in grad school."
That really got Chuck's attention. "Dad, you went to school with Ted Roark?"
"The Roark Instruments guy? Awesome," Devon said, equally impressed.
"Yeah," Stephen replied, not even remotely impressed. "He took all my ideas, and, uh…I never got anything. Guy's a lying thief."
"Well, how about I, uh, order some pizza. Pepperoni?" Ellie said to relieve the tension.
"Speaking of television," Devon continued, taking Ellie's cue to change the subject. "What do you think about your son dating Sarah Walker? Hanging out with all of those stars? We've met them, and they're all awesome."
"Yeah, Dad. I mean, the last seven months have been great," Chuck said, conveniently leaving out how often he had come within inches of death during that time period. "And Devon's right. John Casey, Carina Miller, they're great. Jimmy Slade, he used to study computers. I'll bet he'd have a lot of questions for you."
Stephen bristled at that. "No…no, sorry Chuck. That's…not a good idea."
"Why? They're not your typical actors. They're all really great."
"I just can't, OK? Please."
Chuck, Ellie, and Devon looked at each other in surprise.
"Pizza…pizza does sound good, El," Stephen said. "Delivery is a little tough out where I live."
Ellie nodded and got on the phone. Devon went to get some wine and put plates out on the table. Chuck continued to stare in confusion at his father. It didn't make sense. He had already met Sarah. What was wrong with the rest of the team?
Tangerine Hotel – Burbank, CA
April 11, 2016
1:00 PM PDT
Casey, Carina, and Jimmy entered the conference room loaded down with documentation and what appeared to be more blueprints. Sarah turned and initiated a videoconference with General Beckman.
"Do you have everything?" Beckman asked.
Carina nodded. "We have everything we could get without getting caught," he replied. "I'm not sure how much this stuff will help. I'm assuming all the really good intel is on their servers, and it's obvious Roark spends as much time on network security as he does on the golf course."
"Do we have a back door established into their systems?"
"Installed that this morning," Casey replied. "We slipped a wireless router on the computer of a secretary who is out this week. It'll spoof the IP address of the computer so we can access their network without them finding out. It's then up to the crypto team to get past the firewall."
"They should be out there by later tonight. Make sure you're ready for them."
"Understood," Sarah replied and disconnected the link. "Chuck, do you think you and Jimmy can handle the intel we've already received? Case, Carina, and I will head to the NSA office to make sure Beckman's crypto team has everything they need."
"Sure, you got it," Chuck replied. Sarah, Casey, and Carina departed as Jimmy started laying out the papers and blueprints the team acquired from Roark Instruments.
Chuck took a look at the blueprints. "You got the ones for the entire building? I don't think either one of us knows a lot about architecture."
"True, but maybe your Intersect will see something we missed," Jimmy replied. He then stretched and craned his neck. "I need to get some coffee first. I spent most of last night crawling through duct work."
He headed towards the door. "Do you want anything from downstairs?" he asked.
"No, I'm good. Thanks," Chuck replied. Jimmy departed and Chuck began to look over the plans. He felt like he was back in college going through a homework project in his electrical engineering class. Only now, the entire country was in the balance. The team kept telling him to keep that part out of his mind and just study, but he couldn't do it. He never felt pressure like this before. Fulcrum was planning something big, and Roark Instruments was definitely in on it. But what? Were they going to take over computer systems throughout the country? That seemed almost laughable, like something straight out of a movie. But given what he had been through over the last seven months, he didn't put it past them.
Then a horrifying thought went through his mind. Is Fulcrum trying to build an Intersect?
The idea made him shudder, and he started looking through the computer code again in desperation, attempting to see if anything matched the research he saw from Dr. Busgang. There had to be something in the documents. Something that proved they were working on their own Intersect.
He got up and stretched. This WAS starting to feel like one of those engineering projects in college he would sink his teeth into and not let go, no matter how many times he pounded his head into the wall when he was stumped. He remembered it drove Jill nuts, one of the few foibles he had that actually annoyed her. But then, maybe she couldn't fault him for it because she was like that herself when faced with a problem she couldn't solve. He gave a long exhale, regretting now he didn't have Jimmy get him some coffee.
He went over to the new items the team brought in and glanced through them. Nothing looked out of the ordinary at first. He then unfurled the blueprints of the Roark Instruments campus. He looked at the first page, which gave an overall layout. He then leafed through the other pages, which were renditions of the various buildings around the campus. He didn't flash on anything and put the pages back.
"Everything OK, Chuck?"
Chuck gasped and jumped in surprise. Jimmy had returned with his coffee.
"Sorry, didn't mean to scare you," Jimmy said apologetically. "Any luck so far?"
"Nothing," Chuck replied.
"Don't get down. We just have to keep at it." Jimmy started going through some of the documentation.
"I…it just feels like the more we do, the bigger this gets. I'm starting to wonder if we can actually stop them."
"We will. Sarah's right; we are the best team of agents the government has. And what you've done has made us a hundred times better. I'll take the way things the way they are now over how things used to be any day of the week."
"How were things before you were put on the team? I mean, you were a spy before meeting everybody, right?"
Jimmy nodded. "I worked for six years on my own. Things were a lot different then. My track record made me look like Jason Bourne's pissed off older brother. Spy work wasn't exactly exotic locales and hot women for me when I first started. I did mostly the hardcore dirty work."
"Well, you did say the Intersect got you locked up and gave you severe pain, so I can certainly understand being angry all those years."
"The Intersect was only part of it. Things were bad for me…well, my whole life."
"Yeah, I remember you saying that," Chuck replied quietly. "You had no one to talk to? No friends? What about your family?"
Jimmy shook his head. "You know how every school had that one kid everybody picked on? I mean…everybody?"
Chuck grinned. "Yeah, I'm best friends with him."
Jimmy smiled. "Well, imagine Morgan not having you for a friend. How bad would things be for him then? Of course, that was just the tip of the iceberg. My mother and sister were killed by a drunk driver when I was eight. And I didn't find out until high school that it was my father who was the drunk driver. Ran the car right into a tree." Jimmy was quiet for a moment. "I thought after getting away from him I could change things. I didn't want to turn into him, a no-good drunken prick. But college was just as bad. Then I signed up for this experiment they told us was to make teaching more efficient. I should have known better. I was the only one of the ten they actually experimented on. They abandoned the project and told everybody I had killed myself."
"What happened to the other nine students? Anything?"
Jimmy laughed with ample amounts of disbelief. "The government had them work on a computer project to cover up the spending they did for the Intersect. Actually, you may know a couple of them. Marc Andreessen, Eric Bina?"
Chuck's eyes widened in complete shock. "No…"
"Yup."
"The test candidates went on to invent Mosaic? The basis for every single web browser we use today?" Chuck was stunned silent. "So, let me get this straight. Not only were you constantly teased in high school, lost your family, driven crazy by the Intersect, spent eleven years in prison without a trial, you ALSO lost a shot at being a millionaire?"
"Well, when you say it like that, you make it sound so bad," Jimmy replied sarcastically.
"My God. I can certainly understand why you have so much loyalty to Sarah and the team."
Jimmy nodded. "Yeah, she straightened my fat ass out. The more I think about it, putting me on the team after Bryce disappeared was a brilliant move on Graham's part. He knew I needed someone to take my spy work to the next level, and Sarah needed someone who would make her focus on leading the team. Win-win, I guess."
Chuck was silent for a moment. "How did they finally get the Intersect out of you? I can't believe I never thought to ask that question. I mean, if they got it out of you, there must be a way to get it out of me."
Jimmy shrugged. "I have no idea. They took it out six years ago. They never really explained how. They just had me sit at a computer, they showed me a bunch of images, and I never flashed again. Although to be fair, the longer I had it, the fewer things I flashed on. Maybe the information I possessed became outdated. But I never found out how they did it."
Chuck tried to stifle a yawn. "Guess you needed some coffee after all," Jimmy said with a smile.
"Yeah, you're right," Chuck replied. "It feels like freshman year at Stanford all over again."
"No sweat; I could use some more myself. Back in a few."
Jimmy departed, and Chuck began to look through the documentation again. There had to be something here. He figured the answer was sitting right in front of him and he just wasn't seeing it.
He then froze.
He grabbed the comic book which contained the cards from Dr. Busgang's research and opened to a particular schematic. It was a large outline of the Intersect computer. He then put it next to the blueprint for the RI campus and compared the two.
They were the same.
Suddenly it all made sense. The CIA needed a supercomputer to handle all of the Intersect data, so it would make sense that Fulcrum would need someone like Ted Roark to build them a supercomputer. Just like the data was downloaded into him, Fulcrum could download data into their agents. But where would they get it? It appeared there were moles in many government agencies, but they could only get so much intel, just like Sarah's team was limited in the amount of intel they could get.
RIOS, he thought. What if Roark used the release of the new operating system to infiltrate computers in the government, in corporations, in just about any organization in the country? The software could be configured to steal any data Fulcrum needed.
Chuck began to hyperventilate at the thought of being right and he could feel his chest constricting. He wanted to warn Sarah, warn the team Roark was doing this. But he didn't want to put the team in trouble. Sarah was almost fired for backing him. He couldn't risk them on what was a very wild hunch. He refused to let them get hurt only to be wrong.
He had to get the proof himself.
Roark Instruments – Irvine, CA
April 11, 2016
9:00 PM PDT
Chuck hid in the bushes near the front door to Roark Instruments. The team had gone to the NSA regional office to meet with Beckman's crypto team to go over the specifics of the software and code they were able to procure from RI. Chuck told them he could continue to analyze the existing intel at the hotel, and they agreed immediately. He felt guilty about deceiving them like that, but he couldn't handle one of them getting hurt over something even he wasn't certain of. He borrowed Casey's flak jacket and holstered a pair of tranq guns. He also wore the watch the team gave him, just in case he did find the evidence or he had no choice but to call for help.
Someone exited the building and Chuck snuck in behind their backs, slipping into the entrance before the door closed. He took the graphic he found online of RI's campus and studied it, comparing it to the card in Busgang's research showing the design specs for the Intersect computer. He snuck down the hall to where the central core should have been. He could then hear footsteps. He looked to his left and found a lab with an unlocked door. He quickly hid as the figure moved down the hallway. He didn't get a good glimpse of him, but he saw a group of guards surround the man in question. He then shook in fear when the man turned in his direction.
His father was at Roark Instruments.
What the hell is he doing here? Chuck thought. He knew his father hated Ted Roark and accused him of stealing his ideas, but what was he thinking in coming down to RI and confronting Roark?
The five agents held Stephen. "What should we do with him?" one of agents asked over their radio.
"Bring him in. We'll deal with it in private," was the response. Chuck then flashed at hearing the voice, seeing a file on Javier Diaz, Fulcrum's head of computer espionage.
Chuck's eyes widened. He couldn't let his father be taken by Fulcrum. He pulled out the two tranq pistols and shut his eyes, attempting to clear his mind and concentrate. He threw the door open and came out screaming, firing away at the agents with both tranq guns. He fired over and over until he was out of darts.
All of the agents fell, and only Stephen remained. He looked at his son in total shock.
"Dad, Dad," Chuck panted. "We have to go. We have to go right now. I can explain all this to you later. For now, all I can tell you is…I'm not who you think I am."
The doors slid open behind them, and Agent Diaz stood with a gun pointed at them. "It's good to see you again," he said to Stephen. "Good to see both of you."
Diaz motioned with his gun for Chuck and Stephen to put their hands up. Chuck put his hands up and hit the two buttons on the watch.
"Don't worry, Charles," Stephen said. "I'm not who you think I am, either."
"Hands up," Diaz ordered.
Stephen put his hands above his head and slid his right hand towards an electronic device on his left wrist. He punched a series of buttons. The doors slammed hard onto Diaz, trapping him. Stephen nailed him with two roundhouses as sirens began to blare throughout the facility. He typed on the device again, and the doors released. Stephen kicked Diaz in the face to knock him out.
He turned back to a stunned Chuck. "Are you coming? We should go, Charles."
"Oh, my God. You…you're Orion!"
Stephen nodded. "We should hurry."
They started walking down the hall. "I can't believe it. My father invented the Intersect."
"Well, not all of it," Stephen replied. "Just the really cool stuff."
Stephen typed on his wrist device and found the room he was looking for. He continued faster down the hallway.
"But why now? You must have known where I was. I was certainly in the public eye enough. Why didn't you contact me sooner?"
"I couldn't risk putting you or Ellie in danger. Ever since you were kids, when I disappeared, I had to do it to protect you. The government wouldn't let me walk away from the Intersect project and I didn't want to harm another innocent person because of it. That's why I had to disappear."
Chuck stared at him in shock. "You were the one to put the Intersect in Jimmy 25 years ago! That's why you didn't want to meet any of Sarah's team. It wasn't about the team; you didn't want Jimmy to see you."
Stephen nodded. "After what I put him through, he'd probably want to kill me. I thought the Intersect had driven him to suicide, and I refused to put anyone else through that. But once he became an agent, he popped back up on the radar and I had a chance to fix the horrible mistake I made."
"You sent the government the file to get rid of his Intersect."
"Exactly. I really wanted to stay away, but then I just barely escaped from Fulcrum in Hong Kong. I thought I had covered my tracks, but I was wrong."
Chuck thought for a moment. "That was the data Cole Barker found! All those images of me! And those map coordinates!"
"That was an incredible stroke of luck that Carina was attracted to Cole. I figured he knew you were the Intersect, and I had to stop Fulcrum from torturing him. That's why I helped Carina and Jimmy with his rescue."
"And you knew Busgang would lead us to the Intersect data."
Stephen sighed. "I knew I would have to spend the rest of my life hiding from the Intersect, but I never imagined that it would find you. That's why I came back. It's my fault you're in this and I have to get you out of it. That's why Sarah was able to find you. I wanted her to. What those four can do, how they've protected you, they're the first people I've ever trusted since this started."
"You knew Sarah and her team were really spies? Then why didn't you just say who you were when we found you? Why not just tell me the truth?"
"Would you have believed me? After not seeing me for ten years? I just appear, bring you to RI, and tell you I can get the Intersect…which I also built…out of your head? What would you have said to that?"
Chuck hemmed and hawed for a second. "That you were…a little bit crazy."
"Exactly."
They stopped at a large door with a Feistel cipher security code. "Now flash or we'll be a little bit dead," Stephen said firmly, pointing at the code panel.
"Listen. No, Dad, you don't understand. It doesn't work like that." He pointed to his head. "Unless it's in here, I can't do that."
"Yes you can. I designed that computer in your head, son. Flash, and it will be the last thing you ever have to flash on."
Chuck looked at his father and saw the confidence he had in him. He gave a little smile and concentrated on the keypad. He was surprised to indeed flash, seeing the correct sequence to punch into the keypad. The door slid open.
"Aces, Charles," Stephen said.
The two walked into a very large room with a single table and two chairs. Sitting on the center of the table was a long cylinder with a spinning cube inside of it.
"That's the Intersect?" Chuck asked, pointing at the cylinder.
"2.0," Stephen replied. "My baby. My greatest creation. After you and your sister, of course."
Stephen pointed at the chair to the right. "Let's make that the hot seat."
He went over to the chair on the left while Chuck sat at the chair on the right. Stephen typed a few commands into the keyboard in front of him and a glass monitor slid upward for each of them.
"We need to make some minor modifications to Roark's software so that the images can be programmed to take the Intersect out of you."
He brought up several screens of computer code and began to make changes to it. "So, I'll see a bunch of encoded images like I did when I first got this?"
"Precisely. They'll cancel out the ones that you originally uploaded."
Stephen typed in a few more modifications. He then put on a pair of sunglasses. "Ready?" he asked Chuck. Chuck nodded.
"Good luck, Charles," Stephen said and hit the [ENTER] key.
Images began to appear on the monitor in front of Chuck but then stopped. Red lights began to strobe on the screen and sirens began to blare throughout the room.
"Something's wrong," Stephen said as panic began to creep into his voice. "No, no, NO! It's not working!"
The doors suddenly slid open. Agent Diaz and several of his men were there. And Ted Roark was with them.
"No, it doesn't work," Roark said. "But I'm sure you'll have it up and running in no time."
All of the agents trained their guns on Chuck and Stephen. "You always did have a way with computers, Orion. And remember? I always had…well, I always had a way with the girls."
Roark put his hands on Stephen's shoulders. "Hey, what's the matter, man? No hug for your old partner? No? I've been looking for you for a long time. The years have been unkind. I could offer you a good moisturizer. Huh?" Stephen replied with silence. "No? OK."
Roark turned to his men. "Put him on the helicopter. Kill the CIA agent."
"He's my son," Stephen replied.
"He's your son?!" Roark stared in wide-eyed surprise. "Congratulations! That's great! I had no idea." Again he looked at his men. "Kill the son."
One agent grabbed the Intersect cube as the others turned their weapons towards Chuck. "Wait, I-I'll…I'll build anything you want," Stephen said in defeat. "Give Fulcrum their Intersect. But my son walks away from here. You don't touch him, my family, or his friends."
Diaz turned his gun towards Stephen. "You'll build it either way.," he said in a menacing tone.
Stephen turned to him in utter contempt. "You gonna torture me? After ten years away from my family? My son walks away! You touch any one of them and you get nothing!"
"All right, all right," Roark replied, trying to calm him down. "I'm not a monster. I'm a…little bit of a monster. But today is his lucky day. And besides, what if they cancel the show? I mean, I guess I could binge-watch that TV show about zombies on Netflix, but it's really not my thing."
Roark started walking towards the exit. "Shotgun on the chopper! Let's go."
Stephen gently pulled Chuck towards the opposite exit and hit a button on the keypad to open the door. "Take care of your sister. Keep an eye on the team. And make sure you tell Jimmy how sorry I am to have put him through all of that."
"Dad…"
"You can do this without me."
"I'm not going to leave you!" Chuck said in desperation as Sarah, Casey, Carina, and Jimmy came up behind him in full tactical gear. Everyone pointed their guns.
"If your son's going to walk, he should do it now," Diaz warned.
Sarah stepped forward and stood next to Chuck. Stephen took one last look between them and gave a little smile.
"Goodbye, Chuck," he said sadly.
"NOOOO!" Chuck screamed and tried to lunge forward. Sarah and Casey restrained Chuck, dragging him out the door while Carina and Jimmy kept their guns on Roark's men. Diaz pushed a button and the doors slid shut.
"DAD!" Chuck screamed one more time as his father disappeared from view. Tears formed in his eyes as Sarah and Casey held on to him.
Echo Park – Los Angeles, CA
April 12, 2016
7:00 PM PDT
Ellie walked into the kitchen after a long day at the hospital. "Dad?" she called, expecting him to still be somewhere in the apartment. She then saw the plate of pancakes on the table.
"Dad?" she called again, approaching the kitchen. Instead, she saw Devon pulling some items out of the refrigerator.
"Ellie, I don't know how to tell you this," he began sadly. "I think your dad may have split. His stuff's all gone."
Ellie dropped her keys on the table as she could feel herself choking up. Tears started to fall from her eyes.
"Hey, hey, I'm sure he's planning on coming back for the wedding."
"No, no he's not," she said, becoming more emotional by the second.
Devon took her in his arms. "Well, if it's any consolation, I'm not going anywhere. I mean, no matter how hard things get between us. Because that's what married people do, right?"
She smiled and took his face in her hands, giving him a passionate kiss. She then rested her head on his chest. "This is my fault. I…I shouldn't have asked Chuck to find him. I thought I needed him to walk me down the aisle. I thought he would be different from that guy that walked out on us. I guess I just expected too much from him."
Devon held her tightly and buried his face in her hair. "Hey, I've got the most beautiful woman in the world in my arms right now. And a woman who never gives up. She had to learn that from somewhere. Don't count him out yet, El. He's coming back. He knows how special you are. And so do I."
Ellie's grip on Devon increased.
Buy More – Burbank, CA
April 12, 2016
7:00 PM PDT
Chuck walked into the Buy More in a daze. It had been 24 hours and it still didn't feel real to him. His father had invented the Intersect. His father had been helping the team to get the Intersect out of him. And now he was in the hands of Fulcrum. He didn't know what to do, and nobody had talked to him about it since. Maybe they figured he needed some space after what happened, but the truth was he needed to talk to someone. He needed a friend.
Unfortunately, Morgan looked the same way he felt.
"Chuck, oh God, Chuck," Morgan said as he walked up to him. "You're not going to believe how badly I screwed up."
Chuck awoke from his daze. He then noticed all of the nasty looks the employees were giving Morgan. He then saw Big Mike wearing a green Buy More polo shirt.
"What? What's going on?" Chuck asked in confusion.
"Dude, I…I can't believe this happened. Emmett is the new manager of the Buy More. And it's my fault. I thought corporate was coming to rate his performance, and he convinced me to get everybody to talk him up so he got promoted and would leave the store. But then I find out corporate was here to evaluate Big Mike, not Emmett. They demote Big Mike and put Emmett in charge of the store!"
Morgan looked ready to tear his hair out. "God, can you imagine a worse situation? Emmett's in charge and I put him there! They're going to kill me!"
Chuck stared at Morgan. He didn't have to imagine a worse situation. He was right in the middle of one. Thinking he could protect the team by going off on his own, and his father was captured as a result. He could barely keep himself together. He was so close to succeeding and now he couldn't shake the fear he may never see his father again.
"Sorry, buddy," Chuck replied with absolutely no energy behind it.
Tangerine Hotel – Burbank, CA
April 12, 2016
7:00 PM PDT
"Chuck went to Roark Instruments on his own!? And allowed Orion to be captured!? How could you let this happen!?"
To say Beckman was upset was the understatement of the year. Sarah, Casey, Carina, and Jimmy delivered their report from what happened last night. The general was beyond incensed.
"We weren't expecting that," Sarah admitted. "Chuck figured out Roark Instruments had built their own Intersect computer but didn't want to risk us over it."
"And now Orion is in the hands of Fulcrum. And fixing their Intersect. Where is Chuck now?"
"He's talking to Morgan at the Buy More," Carina replied. "We're watching him even as we speak."
"Forget it. The human Intersect project has become too hard to control. I can't afford to wonder anymore if this team or Chuck Bartowski is a liability."
"What are you saying, General?" Sarah asked.
"I'm shutting down this project. Chuck's going into lockdown. He'll be taken to Washington and put into a secure facility once and for all."
"You're making a mistake, General."
"I have made my decision, Agent Walker," Beckman replied with absolute finality. "I have contacted the NSA office to bring Chuck in."
"Chuck isn't going to go down without a fight."
"That's why there won't be one. Chuck trusts you, Sarah. He thinks you would never betray him. Use that. You'll go to the Buy More and tell him we intercepted his father while being transported and he's back at the hotel. You will then deliver him to the NSA team, who will tranq him and have him here in D.C. before the morning."
"We'll be ready, General," Casey said, shocking Sarah, Carina, and Jimmy.
"That is all," Beckman replied. She terminated the link.
Sarah looked at Casey in absolute horror. "How the hell can you…"
Casey gently put his hand up. "One second…"
Buy More – Burbank, CA
April 12, 2016
7:45 PM PDT
"I trusted the wrong man, Chuck," Morgan lamented. "And now…now I've screwed everything up." He exhaled in frustration. "Sorry I went on like that. How are you? Things good with Sarah?"
"Yeah," Chuck replied quietly, his mind a million miles away. "Things are good."
Both of them turned when they saw Sarah walk into the store. "Hey sweetie," she said to Chuck, giving him a quick kiss. "Morgan, can I talk to him alone for a moment?"
"Sure," Morgan replied. "Not a problem." They watched Morgan slunk away with his head down.
"Good news, Chuck," Sarah said. "They found your father."
Chuck's mouth dropped open in amazement. "How? Where is he?"
"One of our recon teams intercepted his transport as Fulcrum was moving him. He's back at the hotel. He's safe, Chuck. It's all over."
Chuck's expression transformed into a huge smile. "Thank you, Sarah. You told me to trust you and you were right. You've always looked out for me and kept me safe. You…you're amazing."
"Come on. Let's go see him."
Sarah took Chuck's hand and led him out of the Buy More. They turned the corner towards her car. Casey, Carina, and Jimmy were waiting for them.
"Good, you found him," Carina said. "Chuck we're really sorry, but we have our orders."
"Orders?"
Sarah looked at her in total shock. She then reached into her coat and pulled out two tranq guns, firing repeatedly at Casey and Jimmy. They fell to the ground as Carina ducked and rolled to avoid being hit herself. She kicked upward to knock the tranq guns out of Sarah's hands. She then bounced up, but Sarah was prepared. She blocked Carina's punch and then spun, nailing Carina in the face with a hard kick. Carina promptly went to the ground.
Chuck stood motionless as Sarah reached into Jimmy's bag and grabbed his smartphone and tablet computer. She then took Chuck's watch off of his wrist and threw it away. She pulled at his arm to put him in the passenger seat of her Porsche. She jumped into the driver's seat and floored it out of the parking lot.
"Sarah! Sarah, what's going on?" Chuck asked, almost hyperventilating.
"It's all a lie, Chuck," she said. "Fulcrum still has your father. Beckman sent us to bring you to the NSA office. They were going to take you underground. We have to run."
"But wait, why aren't they helping you? You need your team!"
"They wanted to. The plan was for all of us to disappear together. But I can't put them through that. Just like you broke into Roark Instruments alone because you didn't want to see us harmed, I don't want them charged with treason. I have to do this on my own. I'm responsible for you, Chuck. I got you into this, and it's up to me to get you out of it."
"But you could go to jail."
Sarah looked out at the road, and Chuck's words weighed heavily. But there was no choice now.
"I know."