Bryce strolled back into the Bartowski/Woodcomb apartment, a grin on his lips and far too much of a bounce in his step for a man who knew what he knew. Chuck glared at him from the comfort of the couch, his happiness at Bryce's kindness momentarily overwhelmed at frustration with him for being so darned annoying. He knew how awkward Chuck was finding this and yet, here he was, acting very much like he did back at Stanford whenever Chuck had a big date and had asked him to clear out for a bit.
"I saw Sarah's car just pull up," Bryce announced, cutting right to the chase for a change. "Dinner's ready, just get it out of the oven and plate it up. And desert, if you want it, is in the fridge. Guest bed sheets are fresh and there's extra toiletries and stuff for Sarah in the bathroom."
Out of the corner of Chuck's eye, he saw Awesome give Bryce a thumbs up, clearly communicating how good of a friend he was being to Chuck. Chuck, on the other hand, glanced at the floor in the hope that it might decide to open up and swallow him to spare him from the rest of the night. Unfortunately, as had been long established, the universe wasn't feeling particularly kind towards him, so the floor stubbornly stayed solid.
"Thanks, buddy," Chuck said eventually, focusing on the part of himself that was touched by his friend's thoughtfulness. "You didn't have to go through all that trouble though."
"I lived with you for three years, Chuck," Bryce reminded him, nudging him off the couch. "There's no way I'm subjecting a nice girl like Sarah to the trials of your cooking."
"You never objected to my chicken soup," Chuck muttered petulantly.
"That's because chicken soup is the only thing you can make, buddy," Bryce reminded him, not at all apologetic. "Do I need to remind you of the time you nearly set the frat house kitchen on fire trying to make dinner?"
A knock at the door saved Chuck from any further reminders of his less skillful moments with kitchen appliances. He really didn't need Bryce to remember the incident with the blender. Or the microwave.
Chuck opened the door, intending to get outside without having to subject Sarah to the idiots - and he meant that lovingly, honest - inside his apartment. Unfortunately, Bryce and Awesome both stood too, their far too wide, far too bright grins fixed on the sliver of Sarah visible.
"Evening Chuck," Sarah greeted warmly, clearly ignoring the far too good-looking society standing behind Chuck.
"Hey, Sarah," he replied, oddly feeling a little less awkward at her easy smile. "I apologise in advance for this."
Sarah's brow furrowed, Chuck stepping back and letting her inside.
"Hi, Sarah!" Bryce and Awesome sang in unison. Chuck suddenly had a bad feeling about letting those two bond at all.
"Hello, Devon," Sarah smiled, narrowing her eyes slightly as she turned to her CIA colleague. "Good evening, Bryce."
"We can't stay long, dinner's already ready," Chuck reminded his sister's boyfriend and his best friend.
Bryce stepped forward, offering a grin as warm as it was teasing. "Looking nice tonight, Sarah."
Chuck hadn't known Sarah as long as Bryce had, but he was sure that smile promised nothing good for his recuperating friend.
"Beautiful," Awesome agreed, clapping Chuck on the shoulder. "You're a lucky man, Chuck."
Strangely enough, lucky wasn't one of the things Chuck was feeling right now.
"We should be going," Chuck announced, gently ushering Sarah out of the door. "Night Awesome. Night Bryce."
"Night, Chuck."
"Don't mess with my coffee index, or the tech!"
Chuck rolled his eyes. "Good night, Bryce!"
Laughter drifted through the small crack left in the door. "Night, buddy!"
Chuck let the door shut behind him, meeting Sarah's amused gaze.
"You have the strangest effect on him," she said, seeming almost puzzled.
"Frat brothers," Chuck said wisely. "And I think I bring out the nerd in him. And the gourmet cook, apparently," he added, opening the door to Bryce's apartment.
.
.
The dining room table was set with candles and nice dinnerware and a tablecloth, the scent of something spicy and delicious hovering in the air. Because Ellie had raised Chuck right, he moved to the kitchen and plated up the meal Bryce had thoughtfully made for them. And then he stopped, hovering awkwardly in front of the table.
"Um, I don't exactly know how this is supposed to go," he admitted, watching Sarah stand there a little awkwardly too. He was about ninety percent sure that her awkwardness was affected, but it was nice to pretend she felt as odd about this as he did.
"I think we should probably eat dinner," Sarah announced, nodding to the steaming plates. "I mean, it does look delicious."
"Good- good plan," Chuck agreed, moving Sarah's chair out for her in an act of gallantry he hoped wouldn't be misconstrued. She smiled a little at him, letting him shuffle the chair in after her.
He took his own seat opposite Sarah, letting the true ridiculousness sink in. Here he was on a fake date with his fake girlfriend, yet it felt more real and adult than any date Chuck had ever been on. And it had been entirely prepared by his fake girlfriend's ex-boyfriend in said ex's apartment, and they were here as a precursor to fake sleeping with each other for the first time. Sometimes Chuck felt his life was too ridiculous to be real.
Chuck chuckled a little, downing half the wine in his glass.
"What's wrong?" Sarah asked, fork paused halfway to her lips.
"Nothing," he said, smiling. "Just, our crazy lives."
Sarah lowered her fork, picking up her glass instead. It raised in a toast. "To our crazy lives."
.
.
Dinner passed easily. They discussed everything from whether Casey was capable of smiling at things that didn't involve death or weaponry (they both voted a hard no on that one) to Morgan's unrequited crush on Ellie, and Chuck's timeline of epic nerdiness (AKA, his life). Sarah even parcelled out a few stories from her past, places she'd been in brief moments of downtime between missions for the CIA, vague sketches of high school life, things like that.
They adjourned with desert - plates of decadent tiramisu - to the living room, curling up on opposite ends of the couch to watch an old Cary Grant movie. It wasn't Chuck's usual sort of film, nor Sarah's probably, but it was fun enough, and it passed a decent chunk of time before they could conceivably go their separate ways to bed.
Not long after the credits started rolling Sarah muted the television. Her blue eyes turned to him with understanding. "I know all this isn't exactly easy for you," she began softly. "Hiding things from your family and dealing with spy stuff, and all this." Her hand waved around, as if to encompass the dinner they'd just shared and the implications of their being together here tonight.
Chuck couldn't deny that some parts of his life were difficult, but "It's not all so bad," he offered, wishing they hadn't decided against after dinner coffee. He could really use something to occupy his hands right now. "But, I suppose knowing the rules might be good."
"What do you mean?"
"Are we allowed to see other people?" Chuck asked almost before he'd realised it. "I mean, you're beautiful and I'm sure you could be with any guy you wanted and-"
"It would be tactically challenging," Sarah replied, looking down with a small, slightly awkward smile. "Our cover is boyfriend/girlfriend. And any prospective dates would have to go through a vigorous vetting process to determine their motivation."
Was this really the way the CIA trained their operatives to see romance? Suspiciously?
"Wouldn't their motives be love?"
Chuck realised how idealistic and maybe naive he was sounding, but they were talking about relationships and any successful relationship ought to be predicated on love, or at the very least a mutual affection that might grow into love. One day. Hopefully.
Sarah looked down at her hands again. "Ideally," she conceded. "But you're a very important piece of intelligence - and Casey, Bryce and I, we're important operatives - and we have to be vigilant with who we let into our lives in case they're not all they seem to be."
"Well, that sounds very nice," Chuck muttered drolly, shifting so he could see her more clearly. "But, surely you can't mistrust everyone. There has to be someone you- I- we could be with without it harming national security?"
Sarah smiled sadly. "Spies hardly ever fall in love, Chuck. And if we do, we don't get happy endings."
And if that was a lie, it sounded uncomfortably close to the truth. But Chuck could hardly imagine it, moving from fake relationship to fake relationship, never truly getting to be with someone who could love him- her- them. It wasn't fair.
Sarah peered intently at him, making Chuck wonder if mind reading really was something spies could do if they tried hard enough. "This is about the sandwich girl isn't it? Lou? You like her?"
This really wasn't the kind of conversation he wanted to have with Sarah. He wasn't even sure he was ready to have it at all.
"I think I could like her," Chuck conceded, feeling terrible as soon as he said it.
In the silence following his announcement, the front door slammed open. "Chuck!" Bryce called, striding into the room with a glimmer in his eyes Chuck really didn't like.
"Bryce, we're on a date," Sarah hissed, her tone telling him this really wasn't the right time.
Bryce honestly looked like he couldn't care less. "Red alert!"
Chuck stood warily, frowning. "How bad?"
"Klingons and Romulans are attacking the Enterprise and Kirk and Spock are sitting ducks in a shuttlecraft just outside the hangar doors."
"Okay, that's bad," Chuck squeaked, glancing at Sarah to helpfully clarify; "Really, really bad."
"It's Ellie," Bryce began, voice quiet but no less frantic for it. "She and Awesome were having an argument and then she came into your room and she said some things about you and being a big boy with your big, big girl girlfriend. Then she told me I needed a haircut, which-" Bryce touched his tousled but irritatingly perfect hair self-consciously "-not true."
"Ellie?" Chuck prompted, toeing the line between sheer panic and I-might-throw-up levels of fear.
"Casey came over, asked to borrow milk," Bryce stated, and if he didn't get helpful soon Chuck was going to scream. "Devon left to get it and Casey's milk carton turned into a bug sweeper. We found a bug below Ellie's ear. She collapsed and Devon's waiting on the ambulance."
"Collapsed?" Chuck echoed hollowly. His legs felt like they might do the same any second.
Worry disappeared from Bryce's eyes like shutters closing on his emotions. There wasn't even an everything is going to be okay, Chuck smile on his face. "We think she's been poisoned."
.
.
It was strange how things could change overnight. Only hours before Chuck's only real problem had been spending the night with Sarah without completely spazzing out from awkwardness. Now, his sister was dying from a very bad toxin and there was no cure, no time to let the CIA-NSA doctors synthesise one. The only thing he could do was find the nuclear codes and try and use them to barter for the antidote. For Ellie's sake.
"We do this kind of thing in our sleep," Chuck reminded Sarah and Casey. His plan was good. It was solid. It was logical. It was the right thing to do. And he wasn't going to back down.
Casey circled around Sarah, expression understanding but uncompromising. "Even if we knew where the codes were, that's not a practical plan," he said, tone inviting Chuck to see reason. "We can't risk the bad guy risking millions of lives for the one."
This wasn't just one life. This was Ellie. Chuck's Ellie. His big sister. The one person in his life who had never left him and who never would.
"This is my sister we're talking about," Chuck snapped, angrier than he could ever remember being. "We can't just sit around and watch her die!"
Sarah's eyes were sad and soft but she didn't speak up one way or another.
Bryce was pacing up and down a little further up the hall, a muscle in his jaw was jumping, eyes glancing into Ellie's room every now and then.
"Bryce?" Chuck called, hearing the plea for the help he needed.
"Bad guy's got the antidote," Bryce stated, his too calm voice shaking slightly. "I say, let's find this guy. And, if we have to stake the codes on finding him, then that's what we've gotta do."
"Larkin," Casey growled, eyes narrowing warningly. "If you're compromised working on this case-"
"I've spent summers, Thanksgivings, Christmases with this family. Of course I'm damn compromised," Bryce glared, spinning viciously on his heel to begin another circuit. "That's why I'm here."
Sarah stepped between the two male spies, hands held out in demand for them to calm the hell down. "The only clue we have so far is the bug we found on Ellie," she began, forcing them back to professionalism.
Casey held it out, smirking a little. "Soundproof box. We don't want the bad guy knowing we're onto him."
Chuck met Bryce's eyes, raising his eyebrow slightly. Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
The tiniest dip of Bryce's head. Yeah. But it's reckless.
Narrowed eyes. It's Ellie.
A tiny grin. Do it.
Chuck snatched the bug from Casey's hand, opening the lid of the box. Casey snatched for it, but Chuck danced away, standing behind a protective wall of superspy.
"Found the codes. Can't believe where Mason Whitney hid 'em. I'm going to keep them on the lady doctor until we can move them safely."
Chuck put the lid back on the box, tossing it over Bryce's shoulder to a glaring Casey.
"Now the bad guy's gonna come to us," Casey mused, getting as close to Chuck's personal space as Chuck's self-appointed bodyguard allowed. "Not bad, Bartowski. Do that ever again and I'll kill ya."
Chuck nodded, completely understanding.
Casey moved back a step, glaring daggers at Bryce. "You, I might just kill anyway."
"You had your shot, Casey," Bryce smirked, Chuck not needing to imagine the smirk on his lips. "You blew it."
Sarah stared at Chuck, torn between approval and very strong disapproval. "Casey and I will keep an eye out for the bad guy," she said softly, narrowing her eyes. "Don't let him let you do anything else impulsive."
"That was the stupidest, most reckless thing I have ever done," Chuck announced after his other handlers were gone.
"If it was anyone other than Ellie," Bryce sighed, slumping back into the bland hospital wall.
Chuck stared into Ellie's room, Awesome kissing his sister's hand, talking to her quietly. "She's all I have left, Bryce. I can't lose her."
Bryce pushed off the wall, standing almost close enough they were touching. "It'd take more than a deadly toxin to take down a Bartowski, Chuck," he murmured, as if speaking louder would break the solemnity of their vigil. "I can't promise miracles, buddy. That's beyond even me. But, if an antidote really does exist, I promise you, she will get it."
Chuck nodded silently. All he could do was watch Ellie's heartbeat monitor stubbornly proclaim her life. All he could do was wait for the bad guy to come meet them. All he could do was hope that they'd find the antidote in time.
